


meek shall inherit

by yellow_caballero



Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-18
Updated: 2018-02-02
Packaged: 2019-02-16 08:33:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 96,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13050354
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yellow_caballero/pseuds/yellow_caballero
Summary: "Jeremy Heere was quite possibly the most attractive man ever to grace the Earth, which was a pretty unfortunate quality to have for someone who was literally Satan."Michael wasn't stalking the hottest, douchiest new transfer student Jeremy Heere. He was just investigating Jeremy's possible connection to an overarching conspiracy that encompassed the entire city and made nerds into picture perfect people. He was just keeping an eye on Jeremy's psychopathic best buddy Rich Goranksi, who always seemed to be talking in code - and asking for help.  And he was just teaming up with the school resident theater geek in a covert operation to uncover the mystery of if any of the popular kids had a soul at all.Maybe he was just trying to figure out why Jeremy Heere looked so sad all the time. And maybe the answer would be far more complicated than he could have ever imagined.





	1. Chapter 1

Jeremy Heere was quite possibly the most attractive man ever to grace the Earth, which was a pretty unfortunate quality to have for someone who was literally Satan. 

The problem was that nobody believed him. Not about the attractive part, which was pretty obvious to anybody who had eyes, but the Satan part. Michael had long since resigned himself to his reality of being the lone voice of reason among the high school chaos. He had always been somewhat of a Cassandra among his peers, a solitary line of defense against idiot teenage fads and the senseless sway of adolescent drama. He was proud to carry the burden of immunity against feminine charms as he refused to compromise his ideals, standing tall and alone.

In fact, Michael had long since accustomed himself to being alone period. That was okay. They just couldn’t handle him. There were plenty single player games out there going around. Besides, that was what internet friends were for.

The only major life event so far that had challenged the foundations of Michael’s ordinary life was when Jeremy Heere had transferred to his anonymous suburban New Jersey high school.  

“Are you still going on about this?” Drake asked, popping his gum. He, Wilson, and two or three other boys were sitting in the corner of the cafeteria playing chess and Mario Kart 4DS, often both at the same time. Michael was slumped between Wilson and Drake, the ringleaders of the roving Yugioh Club Phenomenon, eyes glued to his phone, which was glued to Heere. 

He zoomed in carefully. Blue polo shirt today - his gold lined thinner one, welcoming the spring. Pink board shorts - coral, not salmon. Boat shoes. Eating his pita chips and hummus, Roasted Pepper. His favorite kind. 

“You are,” Wilson said worshipfully, “so creepy.”

“Just sign up for his fanclub,” Drake sneered, “you can be the token gay guy.”

Michael honestly wished that he could pretend that the fanclub didn’t exist. Unfortunately, he did not live in that ideal world where there was not a fanclub for a perfectly ordinary transfer student citizen. He would say that his school was going down the toilet if it hadn’t already crawled into the sewers and mutated into the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

“Wait for it,” Michael said. 

Drake shrugged and went back to decimating Sam with Yoshi, practically making the other boy cry through the humiliation. Tim and Ben were half-heartedly pushing chess pieces around, spending more time making the knights hump each other than actually playing. Michael would be sitting by himself if he hadn’t specifically promised Wilson that he’d prove a point this afternoon. The storm had been brewing all day, and Michael was going to capture it all in 480 pixels.

A waifish blonde girl walked over to Heere’s table, carrying a Vera Bradley lunch bag and twirling her hair around one finger. The two top Popular Bitches, Chloe Valentine and Brooke Lohst, practically hissed as their matching jocks, Jake Dillinger and Rich Goranski, lounged about muscley in their seats. Heere said something to her and she flushed. 

Wait for it. Michael had heard her and her friends detail this plan in second period Spanish. This would finally be his proof. 

The girl almost plead for a seat. Brooke, apparently somewhat nicer than Chloe, obligingly scooted over so the other girl could crowd in. Jenna Roland squatted on the other side, texting. She must have smelled blood just as quickly as Michael did, because she actually looked up with her phone and started texting even more furiously. 

His intel gathering mission was hampered by the fact that his caste in the social strata wasn’t high enough that he could sit close to their table to figure out what was being said. The inter-cafeteria buffer zone was mandatory, as to protect his maiden eyes from the brilliance of the popular kids. Looking at Jeremy Heere was like looking at the sun - beautiful and painful, only ever catching a glimpse of it out of the corner of your eye. It was impossible to look into Heere’s eyes for fear of his radiance scorching your corneas.

Guess who ordered eclipse glasses off Amazon, bitch. 

The blonde girl turned to Heere and whispered something in his ear. 

Heere smiled vapidly and said something back. Everyone laughed. Rich Goranski slapped his knee and howled. 

The girl hunched in her seat. 

Heere reached out a hand and rubbed her back, nothing but supportive and caring. 

Then he said something else, and the table broke out into uproarious laughter again. Heere was the picture of sympathy, calling for order among the table and watching it quiet instantly. 

The girl got up and fled the scene. 

Michael grimly lowered his phone. That was the third time this week. They were getting mad with power. 

That was what she got for asking out Jeremy Heere in a public area when she hadn’t even infiltrated the satellites of his satellites. Tier two popular kids lived on the lunch table adjacent to them, moron. She lived on the lunch table on the next row, always yearning in the distance but never touching. Her best bet would have been to date Henry before swinging on the monkey bar of popularity over to Kyle, then maybe Heere. It was a bold move, and Heere had been nothing but gentle and understanding. 

It hadn’t stopped everybody from laughing anyway. 

“I waited for it,” Wilson said, chewing his bologna, “but I’m not sure what I saw.”

Yoshi rolled another victory over the unsuspecting unwashed masses as Michael pulled out his Investigative Notebook and made another record of the incident. He kept a careful eye on Heere’s facial expressions this time. It was all in the eyebrows. 

“What you saw was a perfect deception,” Michael said, clicking his pen mysteriously. “By a perfect person. Or, should I say, not so perfect.”

“Masturbate to his yearbook picture like everyone else!” Ben called from down the table. 

“That’s so fucking creepy!” 

Drake chewed on his Twizzlers. “Then what do you use the folder full of pictures of him on your phone for?”

“Evidence,” Michael hissed, clutching his phone to his chest. “I would never debase myself to fantasizing about...about Satan!”

The table gave him unimpressed looks. “You’re called him the epoch of Lucifer’s heavenly light before he was cast down into hell,” Wilson said. 

“That’s still Satan!”

“Look me in the eyes and say that you don’t masturbate to his yearbook picture,” Ben said. “If you’re pretending you aren’t super gay for him you aren’t doing a good job, dude.”

“He is as hot as the flames of hell he was born from,” Michael hissed. He shook his phone. “And I have proof!”

The others were beginning to look up from their games now, always entertained by Michael’s flights of passion. He just had a lot of feelings, okay! Tim closed his DS, leaning forward across the table, pimples glistening in the fluorescent lights. “Oh yeah? Illuminate our understanding with his heavenly light.”

“Your sass is not appreciated.” Michael stuck his phone under their noses, showing them the picture he took while the others at the table were laughing at Heere’s joke. The others looked at it, then at him, unimpressed. Michael sighed. “That girl totally tried to ask him out. But she didn’t go through the right social channels, see? It’s the job of the popular kids to enforce that. So when Heere turned her down, he made a public execution to teach the lessers their place.”

Wilson lifted his glasses a little, squinting. “It just looks like he’s comforting her to me.”

“That’s the genius.” Michael jabbed a finger at the phone screen. “He’s sweet as apple pie. But Heere’s some kind of genius and he doesn’t do this Machiavellian shit accidentally. If he actually felt sorry for her then the rest of the table would too. You can see how he feels by how he leads the crowd. He pretended to be nice, but he made the rest of the crowd reject her. The crowd doesn’t feel anything Heere doesn’t want them to feel.”

The others stared at him again, jaws slack. Michael’s chest pulsed with pride. The logic was so clear anyone could follow it. Heere made his bread and butter out of being clean cut, yet irresponsible enough to be cool, having perfect grades, sleeping his way through all of the most popular girls and yet respecting them as women, and most of all being as unto Jesus onto his adoring crowds. That was what people picked up on. 

Jeremy Heere made his adoring crowds do the cruelty for him. That was what Michael had picked up on. That, and one other thing.

“You’re way overthinking this,” Wilson said. 

“Get a life,” Drake said. 

“Get laid,” Ben said. 

“No offence, Michael, but this is why people think you’re a freak.” Tim waggled his hand, grinning. “Hey, you got those biology notes you said you’d lend me?”

After all this time Michael would have thought that his heart would grow stronger, but it still rung like a tuning fork at the way they turned away from him. He stood up abruptly from his seat, fists clenched over his phone. He pretended his cheeks weren’t glowing red. 

“They’re in my locker,” Michael gritted out, and whirled out of the table and crashed through the doors of the cafeteria, pretending that after all the time it didn’t still hurt. 

Whatever. He didn’t need those losers. Those losers who looked down their noses even at him. Michael was right, he knew he was. One day they would see. Then Michael could call them all paranoid homos for once and make a big deal about how he suffered their presence. Even in that fantasy he still didn’t have anything better. 

The notes genuinely were in his locker, and refusing to give Tim them now would just make him look petulant. Michael headed towards his locker a few hallways down, hands stuck in his pockets, pausing right before turning a corner. He closed his eyes and took a second to lean against the wall.

He exhaled slowly, feeling even more like a loser than normal. Sometimes he thought that everything else would be okay if he just had one best friend. Someone who was always there for him, could always take on the world with him. Asking to suddenly become Mr. Popular seemed like a lot of work, and Michael wasn’t even sure that he wanted all of the headache that would come with that. But maybe just one friend to play video games with would be cool. 

And, well, if that friend was also really hot and really super gay then maybe -

“What did I do wrong?”

Michael froze. Shit. 

He pressed himself flatter against the wall, feeling like the t-rex from Jurassic Park was just around the corner. It was even worse than that, because this voice could see you if you moved. His trained army of velociraptors would eat Michael alive if he was even caught talking to him. 

“That’s fine, I know. It’s just that we’re supposed to be a team in this.” A pause. “I know. You’re right.” Another, longer pause. Finally, softly, “I’m sorry.”

It was like Heere was in the room with the dinosaur, not Michael. It wasn’t pleading, not quite, but it carried the memory of desperation. 

“We’re still good, right?” Pauses, pauses, and Michael strained to catch the sound of the other voice on the cellphone. Heere exhaled. “Great. No, that’s great. I’ll do even better this time. No more slip-ups, I promise. Right.” Another pause, an awkward laugh. “Work in progress, right?”

If Michael had been expecting a ‘bye’, a ‘see you in class’, or anything, he didn’t get it. He didn’t even have time to hide before Heere strolled right back, the familiar motions of rearranging his perfect hair into greater perfection sending a thick copper bite through Michael’s stomach. When Satan himself had a vulnerable moment, that was what it sounded like. Michael knew without asking that none of his friends had ever heard him apologize like that. 

It was only when Heere slowed down as he passed by him, not stopping but only slowing, that he made eye contact with Michael. If it had been uncertain in the phone call it was clear now - that even as he walked past Michael his eyes widened in real shock and fear, and when he turned his back on Michael his gait almost stumbled. 

The sight of Jeremy Heere off-kilter was almost enough to distract Michael from the fact that he hadn’t been carrying a cell phone at all, but not quite. 

  
  


For a man who collected scraps of contradictory information about Jeremy Heere this newest insight was a goldmine. It was manna from creepy stalker heaven. It was Michael’s prayers answered - that there was genuinely something weird about Jeremy Heere that wasn’t his 4.0 GPA. It was the closest thing to proof that he would ever get. 

Jeremy Heere talked to himself in the hallways. Jeremy Heere...asked for forgiveness to himself in a sterile high school hallway, haunted by lockers and gum wrappers. Jeremy Heere felt fear. 

Maybe he really had a secret cell phone that Michael hadn’t noticed, even if he made a profession out of noticing everything about Heere. 

There was no point. Michael shook his head, fumbling his combination lock several times as he picked up his notebook from his locker. He couldn’t tell the guys. It would be such a douchey thing to pass on. He may be a creepy stalker, but he had, like, ethics. Batman never bent his principles even for the most heinous of criminals, like a killer clown who made people laugh themselves to death, or a giant crocodile, or Jeremy Heere. 

Michael gave a resolute thumbs up to picture of Christian Bale on the inside of his locker door. There but for the grace of god go him.

Ten minutes later, as Michael let himself be carried along by the crowd into class, he did not have a plan so much as a feeling. 

Once again, Michael was left tapping his pencil on the cheap plastic single person desk, ignoring English yet again for the mystery that was Jeremy Heere. Due to a horrible twist of fate they actually shared a lot of classes together even as their social status kept them on opposite ends of the room, two ships passing in the night but never meeting. Michael was left to stare, yearn, and even pine a little. Pine in hatred. Pine because nobody else knew how horrible the guy was and if they all knew then Michael could be validated and Heere would no longer be too perfect to go out with him - strike that, too perfect to acknowledge the evil of his ways! 

The minute Michael tried to turn his brain back to the breathtakingly boring turn of events of nasally children reading from The Crucible he started fantasizing about Heere again, so he turned his thoughts back to Heere to stop from thinking about Heere. 

Some sort of paper was being passed out, Michael glanced it over before letting it land on the desk. That wasn’t so important right now. What was important was Heere talking to himself in the hallways. Maybe he had been mentally running through a conversation with someone. Vividly fantasizing how a conversation was going to go out - Michael did that all the time. Maybe Heere just took it a little far. 

There was no doubt that even though he was talking to himself, it was directed at someone. But who could that someone be? Who could make a king sound like that?

What was the trick to it?

Heere reclined in his seat, laughing at some joke made by Jenna. He then promptly proceeded to tell another, even funnier joke. He grinned as everyone else laughed, smooth and languid like a cat, supple and relaxed and omnipotent. He didn’t look at Michael, didn’t dare to make eye contact for the second time in their lives.

But there was something about the way Heere turned from him that made Michael just know that he was being stared at out of the corner of the eye, as if he was the sun. 

Some random term infiltrated Michael’s consciousness, and he snapped his attention back to the sheet only for his eyes to widen in horror. The teacher droned on, “In order to get into groups for your group project, I recommend working not just with your friends, but with someone whose strengths complement yours.”

Time slowed into surrealist effect. When he scanned the page he saw that the groups were mandatory, and the clocks practically began melting off the walls. Michael looked around the room, abruptly panicking. He hated group projects, even partner projects. Michael was a lone ranger, a rebel. He didn’t play by the rules. He had missed the day in school where they gave out the rulebook. 

“Now go find your partners and decide about what aspect of the book you’re going to create the poster on -”

The room rumbled into frantic chaos. Michael, for reasons he didn’t understand, stood up from his seat. 

He knew something about Heere nobody else did. And Michael...thought things about Heere that nobody else did. He had seen through his innocent facade for his satanic underlying tendencies. 

The horrible sight of the blonde girl fleeing the scene rose in his mind. This was insane, temporary insanity brought on by obsessing about ridding the world of this evil. It was like throwing yourself in front of the Popemobile and asking him to brunch. It would have been social suicide if Michael had a social life. 

Michael wasn’t an impulsive guy. He was smart, he thought things through. But one thought was so all-consuming, so pervasive through his soul that it crowded out common sense and decency. 

Michael clenched the instruction sheet for the group project in his hand, took a deep breath, and walked straight up to Jeremy Heere’s table. 

They didn’t notice him for several agonizing seconds, Jenna and Kyle already partnered up and Heere politely browsing the aligned children for his favorite out of the bunch to work with. Michael had his bets on Jafari, who was an aspiring photographer and president of the JSA. God, this was so stupid. It was like he couldn’t control his own stupid feet or his own stupid mouth. This is why he always got into so much trouble. After all this time, Michael hadn’t changed. He was still his own worst - 

“Do you want to work with me!” Michael blurted, louder than he meant to. Jenna, Kyle and the prospective row of teenagers all turned to look at him, jaws dropping or faces wrinkling in disgust. Several looked away, as if he was a homeless person begging for change. Kyle made little gagging sounds behind his hand. Heere looked politely interested. “For the project!”

Heere stared at him pleasantly.

Michael stared at him back, fists clenched, red in the face. This was how he died. “I actually read the book!”

The small crowd watched them with bated breath, eagerly looking to Heere for social cues and finding none. Heere was staring slightly into the distance, head cocked and eyes glazed. 

Just as Michael was mentally finishing up his will Heere smiled brilliantly, perfect white teeth gleaming in the fluorescent light. “Sure, sounds good.” He began gathering up his stuff, ignoring Jenna’s soft scandalized gasp. “How about your desk?”

Michael had short-circuited almost too hard to answer, forcing out a numb nod as he toddled along back to his seat with a serene Heere on his heels. 

Holy shit. Holy shit! What had he gotten himself into! This was worse than rejection! This was uncharted social territory. Michael had no script for this. Heere - Jeremy? Was he supposed to call him Jeremy now! - laid out his pencil and pens carefully, humming softly as he spread out out his rainbow post-it noted beautiful copy of The Crucible and smoothed out the instruction sheet in front of him. All of those thousand imagined conversations with him flew out the window in favor of - whatever the hell this was. 

Maybe what he had heard was more important than he had thought. And he had thought it was pretty damn important. 

But he knew Heere. He eschewed straight threats for insidious subtlety, the kind that fooled everybody into thinking he was sweet and nice and leaving Michael a paranoid lunatic. One way or another Michael was going to walk out of here with a gag order, even if it would be enforced with Rick Goranski using his fist as a gag. Oh god, he was going to die. 

The horrible and impractical part of Michael pointed out that this was how the fantasies always started. Forced together by circumstance, Heere either reveals how he’s secretly a good person with a dying baby sister and they have passionate vanilla sex or he reveals that he’s exactly as evil as Michael had always thought and then they have hate sex. Michael was willing to admit that he was gross. 

It wasn’t hero worship, it was hate worship. Wasn’t it? What was this powerful impulse? 

“Uh, what’s your name again?” 

Michael snapped back to reality, realizing his face was still bright red. He coughed, masterfully keeping down a stammer. “Michael! Michael Mell, at your service. Er. Hi.”

“Hi,” Heere said magnanimously. He pointed to a line in the instructions. “You said that you actually read the book, right? Can you find John Proctor’s quotes on integrity?”

“Yeah,” Michael said, still stunned. “I can do that.”

“Great.” Heere withdrew a pristine sheet of white paper from his binder, slanted writing already scrawled against it. “I put down a few ideas about how we’re going to structure the presentation. I think we should both come up with a comprehensive outline, then whoever’s the stronger writer can finish the paper as the other one writes the script for the presentation and makes the powerpoint.”

“Wow,” Michael said, unendingly stunned, “no wonder you have a 4.0.”

Jeremy grinned sheepishly, scratching the back of his neck with his pencil, sending his perfect hair and Michael’s heart all aflutter. “I just want to get into a good college. It’s all about building a good future for yourself, right?”

“Right,” Michael said slowly, aware of the strange weight Heere had put on the words, “let’s get to it, then.”

Whatever grand confrontations Michael had planned out had failed to pan out, and they spent the rest of the class period talking about nothing but the project. Heere had great ideas, and Michael was even able to dredge up some pretty good quotes and topics for the outline. The popular kids glared daggers at Michael the whole time, and he tried hard not to think about potential retribution. Michael just knew that the minute Heere extracted his precious secrets he would set loose the hounds of war. Warding off his inevitable yet strangely unforthcoming interrogations was the only thing keeping him alive right now.

But for the time being he asked nothing, taking no steps in whatever diabolical evil plan he had concocted in favor of simply working on a project together with a guy he barely knew. It would have been awkward, if Heere was physically capable of awkward. Instead it was...well, nerve-wracking. 

The closest they came to breaching the subject was when the bell rang and they packed up for their next class in companionable silence. They had made a date to work together on the project outside of class that weekend, which was currently scribbled in his planner with way too many exclamation points and hastily sketched drawings of the radioactive warning symbol. His friends were lingering around the door, pointedly checking their watches and talking about their own project, but but even as Michael finished zipping up his bag he saw that Heere was hovering around the desk waiting for him instead. 

Heere shifted on one foot, clasping his hand to his backpack strap in a motion too calculated to be cool. “So why did you ask me to be your partner, anyway?” he asked casually, “I mean, I’m…” he made a gesture towards himself, and then an even vaguer gesture towards Michael. It was fair. 

The second stupid thing Michael did that day was tell him the truth. Or a part of it, anyway. The oldest truth there was about Jeremy Heere. 

“You always seem a little sad,” Michael said plainly. “When I see anyone sad like that I kind of want to help out, you know?”

“Yeah,” Jeremy said dumbly, as if he needed the help of someone like Michael, as if it mattered. His eyes had widened and he had almost taken an unconscious step back. “That’s really…” he trailed off again, looking at the floor. When he looked up again Michael saw, to his electric shock, that he was blushing. “That’s really nice of you.”

They mutually fled the scene, faces beet red, hopelessly confused. 

  
  
  
  


Life had not started magically making any more sense the next day, when Michael climbed the steps to enter the school only to find a clique of juniors that broke out into stares and giggles the moment they saw him.

After a murder of goths snickered at him in the stairwell Michael was forced to check his fly, his breath, and his face in general for anything overly gross. By the time that he saw a circle of white girls flip their hair and look away when they saw him Michael was beginning to grow resigned to the fact that something hideously embarrassing had happened to him that was far worse than spinach in his teeth.

He fought not to let his head hang as he dove into the hallway, setting his jaw and looking straight ahead in a silent challenge that nobody seemed willing to take. It felt as if everyone was looking at him, judging him or laughing at him or shaking their heads in pity. It was made worse for the fact that he knew some of them were, that someone out there was laughing at him. When that someone could have been anyone it became everyone, and Michael bit the inside of his cheek as he turned into the school hallway with his locker. 

It was the first thing he saw. Some sophomore girls were standing next to it, taking pictures with their phones and laughing. Everyone’s eye turned to it as they walked past, and some stopped to rubberneck even as others rolled their eyes and kept going. People were staring at it, and staring at Michael, and he felt his cheeks burn in humiliation. 

Michael silently waded through the crowds of people to his locker, and silently spun the combination as he stared at the giant rainbow letters in permanent marker spelling out HOMO.

Someone had drawn a dick. Joy. 

He could complain to a teacher, except it wouldn’t really do any good. The janitors would get around to wiping it off eventually, given that they didn’t hate him too. He banged the door open, trying to get the crowd around him to scatter even as he refused to look behind him, and wrangled his books out of the mess of game guides and loose homework. Christian Bale smiled winningly at him from the locker door, and Michael ground his teeth before ripping it down and crumpling it into his backpack. Kevin Conroy was a better Batman anyway. 

“Did they dump condoms in there too? Not that you’d need them!” 

He hated this school. Michael silently closed the locker door, sucking in a deep breath and gritting his teeth before whirling around to meet the eyes of Rich Goranski. He was smiling as always, tongue lolling around in his mouth like a dog as Jake Dilinger stood tolerantly behind him. Their football buddies were on their tail, pointing at the locker and laughing. 

“Careful not to get AIDS, Mell!” Kyle called from the back. Michael’s fist tightened around his backpack strap. “I hear that when you die it’s really fucking gross.”

“Switch schools, Mell,” Rich sneered, crossing his arms. His tie dye tank top, as surreal and disturbing as ever, loomed up at him. “Try to hide it a little better next time.”

“The last thing we need is your gross diseases,” Kyle said, copying Rich’s sneer. Michael’s nails dug into his palms. The smartest thing to do would ignore them and go on to class. The path with the long term benefits, not the short term wish fulfillment. 

So obviously he went for the dumb thing. “I think Monica has enough of your gross diseases to worry about,” Michael said, voice shaking, “what with you catching the clap from when you cheated on her.”

There was practically a record scratch as the scene froze. The other footballer’s eyes had widened in a familiar ‘oh shit’ warning. Rich’s grin had stretched to half of his face, practically giggling to himself. Kyle’s cheeks grew ruddy with rage. 

“You’re fucking dead, just you fucking wait!”

Oh no, please don’t. Michael rolled his eyes even has his fist started shaking. “You’ll have to beat the AIDS to it.”

“You’ll regret saying that shit to me, Mell.” Kyle began advancing, practically dropping his backpack, and Michael briefly contemplated taking a step backwards before he realized that his back was already to his lockers. Bad tactical form, Mell. “You take that shit back right now.”

God, the teachers at this school had to be really freaking blind if they let this happen first thing in the morning. Adults were so useless. 

He braced himself, briefly contemplating the idea of yelling really loudly until he could find someone in the vicinity who cared, hating the locker and hating everyone. 

Kyle was barely a step away from getting in Michael’s face and probably promising to beat him up behind the bleachers that afternoon when - 

“What’s going on?”

Jeremy Heere, flanked by Chloe Valentine and Brooke Lohst, was standing behind a suddenly guilty Jake. Michael having been so focused on his fist in face future that he didn’t see them walk up. Brooke smacked her gum, eyes wide, as Chloe made a soft sound of disgust staring at Michael’s locker. Or just staring at Michael. Either one was likely. 

“How tacky.”

Yep, either one was still likely.

But the footballers huddled closer, awkwardly shuffling their feet and looking away as Chloe decreed their crusade a tacky one. Kyle was still glaring bloody murder at Michael, and he peeled away only long enough to snarl at Heere. 

“Did you hear what this douche said to me?”

“Nope,” Heere said. He walked closer, head cocked curiously as he took in the pathetic scene. The luminescent locker, the cunningly drawn dicks, and a red faced Michael standing in front of it with his fists clenched hating his life. Heere frowned a little. “What happened?”

Nobody said anything, the footballers in particular looking everywhere but at Heere. Brooke elbowed Chloe in the side and whispered something in her ear. Rich looked utterly unrepentant. “Who cares? Someone just trashed the homo’s locker.”

“That’s not nice.” Heere’s frown creased deeper. “Why would somebody even do that?”

“It’s Michael,” Chloe said, bored, as if that explained everything. Michael was insulted by the implication that it did. “This is cutting away from my makeup time, Jeremy.”

“In a second,” Heere said, eyes scanning the locker until they came down to rest on Michael. His eyes were big and brown, warm enough to make anybody do anything and just flinty enough to have them think it was their idea in the first place. But they were sad too, maybe even sadder than usual. Heere’s pity tasted sour. 

Well, Michael wasn’t in the mood. He met Heere’s eyes in a fierce glare and let his clenched fists and white hot hate boil through until it had to be obvious to anybody who cared to look. Rich saw it, from the way he practically began giggling. Heere must have seen it too.

If Michael was lucky then Heere would decide that they all had better things to do and that Kyle and the football team could beat Michael up another day. If he was lucky then when he came to school the next morning the marker would be washed off with nobody even remembering it was even there at all, and Michael could go back to being forgotten too. 

Heere stilled, almost reeling back from the strength of Michael’s glare, and something indescribable flashed across his face. It almost looked like a real human emotion. 

In the next second it was gone, and Heere’s pity with it. He stuck a hand in his pocket, gazing lazily around the assembly before he lingered over an uncertain Kyle. “Sorry, I just don’t see why we should care.”

Kyle puffed himself up, face still ruddy with anger. He looked like a chicken. “He was talking shit about me and Monica.”

“It can’t be any worse than what Monica says.” Heere scratched his nose, pretending he couldn’t see Kyle’s flinch. “Why does what this guy says matter?”

The crowd faltered. Why did they care what Michael said? He was a nobody. He didn’t even register on the radar of people like them - at least, that was what they liked to pretend. Nobody was so above it all that an insult didn’t hurt them, not really. Especially if it was true. 

“He was disrespecting me,” Kyle said lamely. “You can’t let people get away with that, man.”

“Self-worth comes from within,” Heere said earnestly. Rich snickered. “When you let others dictate your self-worth you give them control over you. It’s all about being positive. You don’t let other people dictate how you feel about yourself, right?”

It was like some kind of bizarre self-help session. Kyle was caught just as off guard as Michael was. Chloe and Brooke, from behind him, nodded supportively. They were probably in on it. 

“I...I guess not.”

“I’m proud of you.” Heere smiled winningly at them before the friendly expression was wiped away. He sobered, hoisting his backpack higher on his shoulder.“Rich, find out who did this,” Rich mock-saluted as Brooke and Chloe exchanged glances. “Everyone else back off and leave...uh, this guy alone.”

“Leave him alone?” Jake asked, eyebrows skyrocketing. 

“Back off?” Kyle yelped. “Jeremy -”

“This guy?” Michael asked, enraged. “I have a name!”

It was subtle, more in the body language than anything else, but Michael caught it. Heere was the leader now, and as Rich and Jake jumped ship to their reserved spots in the big leagues the football players were left floundering. The mob had broken up in two sentences, and Michael was left wondering what was going to happen to the guy who trashed the locker. Honestly, he had thought it was Rich again. 

Rich clapped his hands, grin never fading even as he gave Heere a friendly punch on the arm, who masterfully hid his wince. “Every day’s a riot with you around, man. Let’s buy some Girl Scout Cookies next, really give back to the community. Maybe adopt a couple mutant puppies.”

“I like puppies,” Brooke said. Chloe patted her hand supportively.

“Everybody likes a good puppy,” Heere agreed. With a jerk of his head and a strategic turn of his posture he dismissed the footballers, and they suddenly found a deep desire to actually go to class. They covered their asses with jovial goodbyes and catch-you-laters, but they knew. Everybody knew. Just as everybody knew that for one bright, hot spark of a second Heere turned to Michael, eyebrows furrowing in concern. “Are you alright?”

Michael’s mouth went dry. He couldn’t have said anything if he wanted. 

“God, can we just go?” Chloe stamped her foot. “I’m going to be late for Spanish. Sr. Diaz is going to, like, kill me.”

“Sr. Diaz thinks you’re hot, you’re fine,” Brooke said, bored. She popped her gum. “Why are we still here?”

But Heere hadn’t lost eye contact with Michael, and something frantic and confused passed between the two of them. Confused was the right word for it - Michael didn’t understand why Heere was helping him, and Heere didn’t seem to understand either. He had hidden it in the usual Heere double feint, sweetness overlaid onto concern trolling, but they had both seen straight through it and were left off-balance. Michael wondered how often Heere didn’t understand something. It couldn’t happen very often. 

Rich had to grab his arm and shake him before Jeremy turned away, but once he did it was a complete and total severance. Something in his posture changed, something different slid over his face, and Michael almost caught his lips moving silently before he turned away to accept his high fives and coy smiles. Brooke popped her gum and Michael screamed inside, because Heere was wearing something and nobody else seemed to see it. 

As easily as they came they started wandering away, Jake making easy conversation with Chloe as Brooke snuggled up under Jeremy’s arm. Only Rich acknowledged him, hanging back from the crowd as Michael forced himself to stand tall against the uncomfortable scrutiny of a sadistic jock. His attention felt like ants crawling underneath his skin. 

Finally, whatever Rich seemed to look for he found, and he relaxed before pasting his sharkish grin back on. “Do you want your fortune?”

Michael hesitated, completely confident that it was a trick question, equally confident that there was no escape. There never was, from Rich. “Sure?”

He leaned in, breath hot on Michael’s face, and his bloodshot eyes honed in on Michael’s. “You’re going to be a lot of trouble for us, Mell.” In the span of a second he flipped his posture and relaxed, laughing and slapping Michael on the back, making him stumble. “Then I’ll have to kill you! Ha, ha! Smell you later, homo!”

So the popular kids swept into his life and swept away. No explanations, no speeches, no rationale - only a decision and a few choice words before moving onto first period. It was almost anticlimactic. It had been Michael’s second opportunity to really express his deep and abiding hatred for his worst enemy, and instead the only thing that Michael received was something he didn’t know what to do with. 

The thought made him want to laugh, made him want to turn the tables on Heere for once. He settled for shouting after them, his voice echoing across the now almost empty halls. “Hey, Heere! I have a name, you know! It’s Michael, Michael Mell!”

The others didn’t turn around, didn’t so much as acknowledge him, but Heere let himself look backwards and smile. “I won’t forget it next time - and if you’re Michael then I’m Jeremy!”

Before Michael could even think of a witty retort he was gone, and Michael was left with a slowly fading white hot flash of brilliant light in his chest and shaken convictions. 

Yeah, Michael thought, don’t forget it next time. Don’t you ever forget it. 

  
  
  


Next time proved to be English class, right after a solitary lunch chewing his rice and agonizing over the mystery of Jeremy Heere. Jeremy, who Michael was willing to admit had become an unexpectedly large presence in his life. He wondered if this was what he had wanted. 

Michael hadn’t really wanted much of anything, and he never did. The strange fascination with Jeremy Heere only started when Michael started suspecting he was the only one who noticed how mean yet weirdly sad he actually was, and it had grown slightly out of control from there. 

He was left to chew his pen and try his best to herd his thoughts back towards The Crucible, huddled in the back of the English room with a very asleep Drake at the next table over. In the front of the room Jenna was delivering a surprisingly insightful commentary on feminist themes, and Jeremy was leaning around in his chair as if he was trying to get a better view of the board despite being right in front of it. 

The last twenty minutes of class were dedicated to working with their partner for the presentation. Michael anxiously clicked his pen over and over again as Jeremy chatted with Jenna, gathered his stuff, and loped easily towards - the door?

His hand lingered over the handle and he shot a significant glance towards Michael, who scrambled to collect his stuff and follow him outside. His heart was pounding. 

“Are we even allowed to work in the library?”

Jeremy shrugged, leading them towards a secluded corner of the silent library where the librarian couldn’t see them. There wasn’t a table but he easily spread his stuff out anyway, sitting down cross legged on the floor as Michael hesitantly followed him. “She knows where we are. That classroom was giving me hives.”

“Amen.” Michael physically had to force himself to stop clicking his pen. Jeremy’s head was ducked over his papers, rearranging them as he booted up his laptop and clicked over to the google doc they had made last period (‘Crucible Project’, which stood in sad comparison to the joke titles Michael usually had for these things) to work on the outline. 

They had seen each other in the hallway, but they hadn’t exactly talked. Were they allowed to talk now? Did Michael care about that, at all, whatsoever? 

No, he did not. “Why did you agree to work with me?” Michael asked. He hadn’t wanted to ask before, almost afraid that it would point out the fact that Jeremy had no good reason for working with him and would suddenly remember. “Or help me out in the hallway earlier?”

Jeremy grunted, bending over his laptop and not meeting Michael’s eyes. “Got nothing better to do.”

That wasn’t true and they both knew it, but Michael recognized the dismissal for what it was and returned to working in relative silence. 

A relationship this confusing could barely be counted as a relationship at all. They were barely even acquaintances, and Michael still spent the whole day thinking about him. Man, he was pathetic. 

By the time they finished most of what they could reasonably get done for the day there was still time left on the clock, so Michael contented himself with taking advantage of the secluded library corner pulling out Mario Kart 4DS. Jeremy was doodling on his notebook paper, apparently playing hangman with...himself. And losing. What?

The volume must have been too loud, because when Michael ripped a hella blue shell on that asshole Waluigi in first place Jeremy practically flinched. Michael glanced up, noticing his eyes fixed firmly on the paper even as his hand was flexing, before just barely catching himself in time to spin out off of the track. 

There it was - he grimaced. His fingers jerked a hard right when Michael flew off the tracks. He turned the volume up a little bit louder, checking Jeremy’s reaction over the top of his DS screen, and let the happy jingle of an invulnerable Star boot carry him through the track as Jeremy twitched his fingers again and the corner of his mouth twitched up into a memory of a smile.

Michael grinned, looking over the top of his DS again. “You play Mario Kart, don’t you.”

Jeremy’s pencil skidded across the page over his hangman game, and he quickly grabbed his wrist with his other hand and forced it back down. When he spoke his voice was even, but the tinge of hysteria couldn’t be hidden. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Blood in the water. Michael leaned in, lowering the DS. “Who do you play as?”

“I don’t play as anyone,” Jeremy said stiffly. 

“I’m going to assume that means Toad.” There it was - his eye definitely twitched that time. Michael was delighted. “Oh, he’s too good for Toad now?”

“I’m too good for Mario Kart period,” Jeremy said. “I don’t even know what that is.”

“So that’s a Peach, then.”

“I do not play as Peach!” Jeremy hissed before pausing a beat. “Because I don’t play at all!”

Michael bit down on a laugh, enjoying the fluster creeping up Jeremy’s neck. “Aw, really? I think you’d be pretty good at it. You got those pianist fingers.”

Jeremy squinted at his fingers, as if they would magically start playing Mario Kart on their own. “You’re delusional.”

“I hear Toad is a really great character to play as,” Michael hinted, and then took a wild guess. “Way better than Dry Bones.”

“Medium weight players are way better than -” Jeremy cut himself off abruptly, face turning red, but it was too late. Michael howled with laughter, slapping his knee even as Jeremy frantically shushed him as he looked around trying to see if anybody had heard.

“So Jeremy Heere’s not too good for video games after all. I didn’t know you had any hobbies besides homework and stamp collecting.”

“I play Halo,” Jeremy said stiffly. The embarrassment was just way too good. “Socially. I only play video games socially. Can we change the subject?” 

“Aw, don’t be like that. I think it’s cu - cool.” Michael bit down hard on his tongue. Cute, really? “Lots of people like video games. They appeal to the universal consciousness.”

Jeremy eyed him warily. “The universal consciousness.”

“Sure!” With his usual flair for the melodramatic Michael splayed his hands out, encompassing  the wide and wonderful world of video games. “Video games bring people together, man. They appeal to both the baser impulses and the higher mind. Everybody’s equal under the beautiful umbrella of video games. With the anonymity of the internet and MMORPGs, you can reinvent yourself into anything you want. Haven’t you ever wanted to be anybody, do anything, and carry a freaking huge sword around?”

Jeremy looked contemplative. “I do like drastic renovations of my personality based off shallow motivations and deeply hidden insecurities.”

“Who doesn’t!” Michael leaned in conspiratorially, and Jeremy unconsciously mimicked the gesture. His warm brown eyes had adopted a new light, something almost approximating interest. “Gamers are a community, man. We stick together. I can’t let you keep on denying your true self, the part of you that longs to main Peach in Super Smash Brothers.”

“I really hope that isn’t my true self,” Jeremy said weakly, not denying it. Score!

“Trust me, I’m loaded with games. If you don’t like at least one of them I’ll eat my headphones.” He paused, poking the ones around his neck with a finger. “I mean, I don’t think eating electronics is good for me, but I’m willing to put my life on the line here.”

“You want me to...what, play your video games?” Even as he put it in the most unflattering way possible, Jeremy was still beginning to look a little excited. “How many do you even have?”

“I’m almost embarrassed to say.” Moreover, he was embarrassed to tell him in particular. It was only a point of pride to anybody who didn’t have...well, actual things to be proud of. "Come on, we need to work on the project outside of school, right? Let’s do it at my place, I can show you my rig.”

They had been planning to meet up in neutral territory, like a coffee shop or the public library, and Michael only realized the implications of the shift once he said it. Jeremy, judging from the way his eyes widened, hadn’t missed it either. 

“Like...hang out?”

Michael’s heart turned on the air sirens and he had to fight to bite down on the stammer. “No, no way! Just, like, working on work stuff! In my home. The video games are optional. Well, maybe optional in the way that once you see how freaking sweet Zombiepocalypse there’s no way you’re not going to want to play it, but they’re more like an addendum. To our project. Much like this conversation is, in and of itself, an addendum. To projects.”

“Oh.” Jeremy ducked his head, rubbing the back of his neck. “Yeah, I like addendums.”

“Me too,” Michael said, relieved, incredulous he had even gotten this far. “They’re my favorite thing.”

Jeremy smiled. “More than the video games?”

“I love peace on earth, the elimination of bigotry, and ube rolls more than video games,” Michael said seriously. “But addendums are up there.”

They were both smiling now, and Jeremy affected a scandalized gasp. “You forgot about Christine!”

“God, how could I have been so blind.” Michael mimicked smacking himself on the forehead. “Peace on earth, the elimination of bigotry, ube rolls, and Christine are all things I love more than video games. Is that everything?”

“I think that covers it.” Jeremy grinned, lopsided but blinding, and something inside Michael rang like a bell. “Everything worth having in the world, right there.”

Yeah, Michael thought, everything in the world worth having was right there. 

  
  


The 7/11 on the corner of Boston and Lafayette was a special 7/11.

Some might say that there was no such thing. That all 7/11s were the same, that even if they weren’t the same nobody quite cared, and that anybody who might take deep personal satisfaction in bearing witness to the majesty of the lopsided, mutant  7/11 near the high school probably needed to get a life. 

Michael had a life. That life included slushies. 

Corner stores were the cornerstones of life, or at least the cornerstone of his. They were also perfectly anonymous and untraceable locations for meetups with anonymous contacts. All identities were preserved in Michael’s adherence to journalistic ethics. Michael was very big on ethics. It seemed like he was the only one sometimes. 

The rotating wire stand of postcards patiently whirled by as Michael spun it one last time, watching the thin cardboard sheets depicting rolling green gardens and the faint view of New York City in the skyline. Some of them were of NYC proper, pretending that you had actually been there and gotten the postcard too. Nobody bragged about visiting suburban New Jersey. 

He picked one up anyway, and he couldn’t help but smile at the ‘Wish You Were Here!’ slogan on one of them. It was a picture of the Jersey Shore, lolling white waves lapping at the sand, fake spray tans not included. He tucked it under his arm. Wish You Were Heere. Ha, ha. 

He ignored the weird kid in a trenchcoat also sipping at a slushie to lean against the counter, grinning winningly at the very unimpressed cashier tagging items. He withdrew a dollar bill from his wallet and made a show of sliding it over the counter, wiggling his eyebrows. 

The cashier, who looked pretty dead inside with dyed black hair cropped to her chin and purple bags under her eyes, was not impressed. “Order like a normal person, Mell.”

One day Michael would master the trick of making his grin sparkle. It would probably help to have white teeth instead of gross yellow ones. “Pour me a cold one, Dana. I’m here to celebrate.”

“Christ, you’re at a convenience store.” She accepted the bills anyway, and turned to the side next to the creepily rotating hot dogs to the slushie machine. 

That was the special aspect of this 7/11. Due to an accident of design, fate, or God, the slushie machine was actually behind the counter. Dana had to pour him the slushie every time. It made him feel like a king. The slushies legitimately tasted better. All other 7/11 slushes had been ruined for him. 

She poured the red slush heavy and thick, jammed a plastic cap over it, grabbed a white paper straw and slid it across the counter. She made fun of him, but she had whipped the top of it like the froth of a beer and her pour was always generous. 

Michael grinned, breaking into the slushie with exaggerated joy. She dug him.

Customers were drifting around the store like flies, weaving in erratic patterns through the aisles as they agonized over a choice of candy or they made straight for the beer. Michael leaned against the plastic case over the counter of nasty donuts and sucked on his slushie as obnoxiously as he possibly could as Dana rung up ratty and forlorn customers with her perfect poker face. Honestly, nobody here looked genuinely happy to be in a 7/11 - well, there was trenchcoat guy, but he was weird. 

Both teenagers waited anxiously for the weirdo to leave before Dana started doing mysterious cashier things with the cash register, leaning forward and lowering her voice. “You have another one. She’s in the back.”

Michael whipped his head back, eyes wide. “No shit. Already?”

Dana nodded grimly. “I know you would be by in a few minutes, so I didn’t bother texting. She’s really upset, dude.”

“Is it…” Michael made a vague gesture. 

In the back of the store the beer cans froze over gently as the ice cream rattled in its boundaries. Dana was Michael’s main booze vendor, as he was her main weed vendor. They had a symbiotic relationship based on slushies and their shared love of people watching. 

The convenience store chugged on, the air conditioner humming and thumping, and Michael’s ghost walked its aisles. It was just a convenience store, but in a thousand sweltering high school days sometimes a slushie and Dana were all he had to look forward to. No hetero. 

Dana looked away, lips thin, working her mysterious cashier magic on the register more aggressively. “Her friend from the soccer team. Something’s seriously messed up in this town, Michael.”

“I can’t believe we’re the only ones who’ve noticed,” Michael said glumly. 

She really did look tired. “That’s the messed up bit.” She looked around, checking for customers, before stealthily unhinging the little gate in the counter and letting Michael slip in. 

The break room, so much as it could even be called that, skulked behind the counter and bore the brunt of generations of bored suburban teenagers, and some slightly more delinquent suburban adults. Convenience stores were the land of the vagrants, and the break room collected the detritus of lives on the go - old magazines, yellowed fornica tables, abandoned coffee cups and outdated textbooks. The floatsam and jetsam feel may have been exacerbated by the flotsam and jetsam girl sunk in a scratchy blue and yellow plaid couch, arms crossed over her chest and sniffling. 

She started when Michael walked in, and he waved weakly. 

Her eyes narrowed, her thick mane of braids sprayed across an oversized soccer championship t-shirt and Nike shorts. She looked like anybody else, but her eyes were red rimmed and bloodshot. She had been sniffling but was trying to hide it. 

She looked like anybody else, but she had information that almost nobody else had. 

“You’re Dana’s guy?” she asked, dripping with condescension. She wrinkled her nose. “That slushie smells gross.”

“Your face smells gross,” Michael said, which was a great start to any interview. He didn’t take it personally, and went ahead and sat a respectable distance away from her on the couch. The table would have been cooler, but he withdrew his cheap red spiral notebook notebook and opened up the recorder app on his phone anyway. “Do you mind if I tape this?”

Her eyebrows shot upwards. “You’re serious about this.” Then her face crumpled, and she looked away to hide her burning eyes. She sniffled again. “You actually believe me.”

“Hey, don’t be sad.” Michael grinned weakly at her. “What’s your name?”

The air conditioner couldn’t be heard back here, already beginning to swelter with heat, and the rustle of the convenience store had quieted. It really felt like it was just them, and as he saw the girl retreat within her own head and pain he knew that their world had shrank to him, a tape recorder, and an anonymous girl who had drifted into the net of Dana’s information network. 

“My name’s Precious Jones. I’m a sophomore at the other anonymous public high school around here.” Precious twisted one of her braids around her finger as Michael nodded sagely. That anonymous public high school always won against his anonymous public high school in basketball. “I’m not crazy, I swear. I’m not overreacting.”

“I didn’t think you were,” Michael said gently. “I think you’re reacting the perfect amount. My name’s Michael Mell, and I bet you have a really crazy story to tell.”

“You got that right,” Precious said glumly. 

They had set it up a while ago. Dana, also an outcast at the same high school, had powers of observation as uncanny as Michael’s. As a booze supplier for the entire grade, she heard stories. The weirder stories she sent to Michael. He thanked his lucky stars everyday that the grim teenager manning the slushie machine had listened to him ramble on. She had been invaluable in the war effort. 

“My friend Aya’s on my soccer team, she goes to that other anonymous public high school. You know, the one the next neighborhood over?” She shook her head, staring into the distance. “I’m worried about her. She changed. Like, creepy changed. Dana said that you might know what’s going on with her.”

“What’s going on with her?” 

Precious shook her head again, eyes distant. “She’s good at math.”

Well, that wasn’t going to convince the courts. Michael took a subtle deep breath, then exhaled. It was hard for people to start with the heavy stuff. “I’m guessing she wasn’t always good at math.” 

The leading question worked. Precious sat up straighter, turning around to actually look at Michael, suddenly impassioned. “That’s exactly it! She completely sucked! She was in remedial Pre-Algebra! But beginning of sophomore year she’s acing every test and making all A’s. She doesn’t stutter any more. She barely even gets mad at me.” Her lip jutted out. “She doesn’t tag me in memes anymore. She doesn’t send me a million ClickerConversations a day. It’s like I don’t even know her.” She faltered. “I’m probably making it sound like we’re not just close friends anymore.”

Michael made a note in his notebook. “That doesn’t explain the math thing. Keep going.”

“That’s not the crazy part,” Precious insisted. “It’s the fact that she’s just so...put together now.” She groaned, burying her head in her hands. “It’s dumb. You don’t believe me. I can’t explain it, but it’s everything. It’s not her anymore. She’s good at school. She’s not clingy like she used to be, she doesn’t snort when she laughs anymore, and she suddenly doesn’t have time to eat all the free samples at Costco? Like, who doesn’t have time to do that? It’s not a big thing. It’s a million little things, everything that made her, her. She’s not herself anymore.” Her shoulders heaved. “I miss her.”

“When did this happen?” Michael asked, scribbling notes down as fast as he could. 

“Last May,” she said, “practically overnight. She just showed up to practice one day and she wasn’t Aya anymore. I don’t know what to do.”

Michael let her sit in silence for a little while, rubbing her eyes and averting her eyes from him. All of the air had gone out of her, and Michael could see clearly the signs of someone sunk deep into memory, twisting and thrashing but unable to escape.

Nobody would ever believe her. Anybody could try harder at math, could stop stuttering, could grow distant from someone who used to be a close friend. It happened. It happened a lot. And Michael was an impartial interviewer and he didn’t want to ask leading questions. 

But if he were her, he would want to know. 

He cleared his throat and flipped a little back in his notebook. Precious looked up, rubbing her eyes, and Michael began reading. “October 23rd. Boyfriend of a friend of Dana’s. His sister stopped smoking and drinking overnight and had joined the debate team. She was the shyest girl in school as a kid.” He flipped through a couple more pages. “December 3rd. Acquaintance of mine. Her best friend of twelve years stopped talking with her overnight. She never talked to her again - she didn’t answer texts, phone calls, emails, and avoided her during school. She had no idea why.” Michael flipped forward some more. “February 15th. Boyfriend told his girlfriend that he loved her. Said girlfriend told me that he had horrible commitment issues, a childhood past that made him feel unable to love, and had been feeling uncertain about their relationship. She said that she had known without a doubt, in every gut sense she had, that he didn’t mean it.” Michael found his voice trailing off quietly. “But she also said that he never lied to her.”

Precious looked shaken. “You know she’s lying,” she said quietly, “you just don’t know how. You can’t explain it. The part of you that loves her...it just knows.”

Michael’s heart broke for her, for everyone who was experiencing this. It was more than he would have expected. If even Michael knew people, if even he could meet people with this problem, then there had to be more. It had to be an epidemic. 

He leaned forward on the couch, looking Precious dead in the eyes, and tapped his notebook. “Precious. Every friend, sister, boyfriend in this notebook? Went to Aya’s high school.”

When they had recognized the pattern Dana had broken open another six pack of Heineken. It was beyond creepy. They hadn’t been expecting it. It really was an epidemic, and that high school was ground zero.

Michael was well aware he had a bit of an overactive imagination. It was what happened when you were alone too often and you smoked a lot of weed. He couldn’t help but imagine it: evil basement perfection boot camp classes, Clockwork Orange style brainwashing machines, evil robots that took over your brain, replacing everyone with pod people. It was all ridiculous. None of it had been backed up by fact. All he was working off of was a good dozen people’s gut instincts. 

But Michael knew. Michael believed. Maybe someday everyone else would too. 

The full implications of the statement had sunk in for Precious too, and her hands were practically shaking. Michael reached into his hoodie pocket and withdrew a slightly battered Hershey Almond bar, passing it to her with a slight smile. She took it numbly and began tearing the wrapper off, and Michael watching her squeeze her eyes shut to stop the tears again. He leaned in, trying to make his voice gentle. She really was just a sophomore. “Hey. Things are going to be okay. Have you talked to Aya about this?”

Precious sniffed again shook her head, taking a big bite out of the bar. “She’s just perfect now,” she said. “People aren’t supposed to be that perfect.”

The cold eyes of Jeremy Heere flashed through Michael’s mind. 

“I know it may look like she hates you now,” Michael said, “but I know it’s not true. I can’t say I know why yet, or what’s happened. But something is happening, Precious. Keep your eyes out. Keep your ears out. Come to me or Dana if you hear anything else. If enough people come forward we should be able to see what’s wrong.” He clenched his fist. “Someone, somewhere is going to crack. And then we’ll know exactly what’s messing with our friends.”

Hopefully. But that wasn’t a good thing to tell a crying sophomore. 

Dana ushered her out, whispering something in her ear and accepting a big hug. As he escaped the dim and battered break room into the similarly dim and battered 7/11, Michael sipping at the melted dregs of his slushie, he couldn’t help but relish the thrum of excitement. What was happening was awful and everyone in the testimonials had been genuinely upset. 

But this was something happening. This was a mystery. This was a chance for Michael to take action. Beat the bad guy, push him aside, solve the puzzle, save the kingdom. 

Michael was going to win this game. And he was putting his name on the top of the leaderboard. Everybody was going to see. 

He lingered by the counter some more, letting his heartbeat slow as it was frozen by the deluge of ice and speed up with the similar deluge of sugar, and watched Dana swipe snack after snack after beer through the counter and usher them on their way. They stood in silence for a little while, watching the world pass by, deep in thought. 

Finally, just as Michael finished sucking on the last of his slushie, he remembered the postcard he had stuck into his hoodie. He fished it out, ignoring Dana’s raised eyebrow, and passed it to her. 

“Can I get this?”

She scanned it judgmentally. “Send an email like normal people. Or are postcards another dumb thing you’re collecting now?”

“It’s for a friend,” Michael protested, “it’s a pun.” He faltered, realizing what he had just said and the implications. He scratched the back of his neck, suddenly flustered. “It’s for someone I hope can be a friend. And I’m never, ever giving it to him. Because we aren’t friends yet.”

She hummed, scanning the item and accepting Michael’s quarters. “Is this why we’re celebrating today?” 

He had forgotten he had said that. Michael coughed. “Burgeoning friendship is a wonderful, beautiful fertile ground of life’s many pleasures and should always be celebrated.”

“How hot is he.”

“So hot,” Michael said worshipfully. “So goddamn hot.”

“Have fun with that.” She pushed him gently on the shoulder, turning him around to face the door. “Get out of my freaking convenience store and go get laid. Say hi to your not-boyfriend for me.”

“We barely even know each other,” Michael said weakly. He clutched the postcard to his chest, but carefully minded creasing it. “I’m a forward thinker, Dana, I plan ahead. This is like betting on the stock market, here. Stock market of love. I mean friendship.”

She sighed, but her face creased itself into an odd arrangement that may have been almost fond. “Michael, you are the dumbest sack of shit I know.”

“Loving the love here.”

“You are so goddamn stupid you still try. You’re one hundred percent you, Michael, you could never be anything less.” She shook her head. “You’re a horrible liar. You just overflow with emotions, it’s disgusting.” But she lifted her head and smiled, and the sunlight beaming through the clouded glass door smeared with posters against cigarettes in the store danced through her hair and made her look almost happy, if only for a brief second. “You have a lot of love to give, Michael. Someday you’ll find someone who deserves it.”

Michael was touched, and his heart was warm and fuzzy. He felt his lip wobbling. “Aw, Dana - “

“Now get the fuck out of my convenience store!”

He beat feet, but he couldn’t stop grinning. She definitely dug him. 

  
  


He had never cleaned so hard in his entire life. 

But it couldn’t be too clean. It couldn’t look as if he had actually cleaned. He just had to sell the fact that he didn’t live with his shit all over the floor. They were going to hang out in the basement - was that too creepy? It was definitely too creepy! - which was Michael’s premier den and hangout spot, and where all of his best games were. It was also even pretty good for studying if they were into that sort of thing. Which they were.

This was an addendum. An addendum of the particular variety that Jeremy liked, because Jeremy was an addendum fan. 

Which was why Michael was vacuuming the floor, wiping down the admittedly grimy surfaces, putting all of his crap away, organizing the shelves, hiding his bongs even more securely than they were hidden before, and severely alarming his parents. 

Granted, they were more alarmed that he was having a friend (“Partner for his project! Not life partner! Why would I even want that? Mother, are you crazy? Are you having a stroke? Mother!”) over than the fact that he was freaking out over it. It was pretty embarrassing that his parents legitimately thought that he was going through all this effort just because he was having somebody over. 

“It’s not just somebody, Mom,” Michael had stressed, “it’s Jeremy Heere!”

His mom had frowned, not looking up from the papers she was signing. She was a lawyer, which was where Michael had gotten his investigative spirit and also his chronic anxiety from. “He’s just a person like you. Just because someone has friends and good grades doesn’t give him more worth than you. We’re all human beings.”

“Are you listening to yourself?” Michael asked flatly. 

She grunted, slapping another paper down on the table aggressively. “When you are all out of high school he will be a deadbeat jock who peaked in high school and you are going to be very, very successful and care for your father and I in our old age.”

“You’re going into a nursing home,” Michael said. “This is America, that’s how we roll here.”

“You’re a little monster and a shame upon your great-grandmother, God rest her soul.”

“Big monster,” he reminded her, “I’m sixteen now. An adult, Mother!”

“Of course,” she agreed amicably, tugging him down so she could kiss him on the head. She switched back into English from the Tagalog they had been speaking before. “That’s why you’re coming to mass with us tonight, because you are big adult and big adults accept Jesus into their hearts.”

Michael mumbled something back. Their Filipino Catholic congregation hadn’t been hot on the whole ‘flamboyantly gay’ thing. He had been skirting the edges of Jesus ever since. 

Really, his mother should have been right. Michael contemplated the matter as he alphabetized his comic books. It was really just high school. Popular kids were just popular kids. He would be cool in college, probably. Popularity didn’t matter at all, and Michael had always known that. He didn’t care where he was, he was happy. A little. 

That was how it should have gone. Jeremy Heere had upped the stakes. He was more than popular, more than the typical cool kid everyone was jealous of because they were nice, funny, smart, popular, better than you. It even more than his casual and subtle bullying. He was just perfect in a way that people weren’t, an uncanny valley where the plastic stretched over his face was curling up just a little at the jaw. 

His hand stilled over his assembly of Green Lantern rings. Perfection too perfect. 

What high school had Jeremy transferred from, again?

“Michael! Your little gay Ubermensch is here!”

“You’re dead to me!” Michael screamed, before running up the stairs. 

His house was normal and suburban, small but comfortably lived in. It seemed even smaller when Michael opened the door to find Jeremy Heere, and realized that he hadn’t yet remembered to adopt a relaxed pose. He should have leaned against the doorframe. The whole evening was ruined. 

Jeremy blinked at him, backpack slung over his shoulders. He was dressed down, rocking distressed jeans and bright blue flannel slung easily over a black t-shirt. Michael felt fluttery. 

Hatred! Michael felt hatred!

Michael’s mother poked her head in from the kitchen, rice spatula in hand. “How long have you two been standing there staring at each other?”

“Mom!”

Jeremy squeaked. Squeaked!

The only person more embarrassing who directly ruined Michael’s life than Michael was his mom. His mom was the worst. He tried to draw himself up all cool like, but he cut it out the minute he realized it was just a pale imitation of Jeremy’s gig. He would be able to tell. 

“So,” Jeremy said, bravely recovering from the squeak. He ruffled his hair, giving Michael a small smile. “Project?”

“Yes!” Michael clapped his hands, relieved at the retreat to familiar territory. “School! I love it!”

“Really?” 

“I refuse to backtrack on my hastily taken convictions! That’s the Michael way!” 

“Okay…?”

This was a disaster. 

It was such a disaster Michael refused to look at Jeremy’s face as he quickly shepherded Jeremy down the stairs into the basement. If he kept staring very intently at the now only slightly gross carpet, he could pretend that none of this was even happening. 

Maybe if he pretended that Jeremy wasn’t perfect, creepy, evil, and incredibly attractive he could talk to him like a normal person. 

Oh, who was he kidding. Michael wasn’t a normal person. No point in trying. 

Dana’s words echoed through his mind. He really was quite a horrible liar. Michael wasn’t really in the habit of lying to himself, and he was even worse at lying to others. 

It was exhausting to be scared, always worrying about what people might be thinking about him, wondering how to make himself seem like a person people could actually like. He had no idea how Jeremy did it. It had to be effortless for him, as easy as breathing. He probably didn’t even need to try. It was easy for perfect people like Jeremy. People like Michael could try their whole lives and never get it, so there was no point in trying. 

On a horrible impulse, Michael turned around and caught sight of Jeremy’s face. 

He was gaping, looking around as he descended the stairs and took in the cramped, musty, kind of dirty basement.

Michael’s basement was soft and hemmed in by tapestries and brick walls, with bookshelves of comic books and young adult novels standing proudly. It smelled a little musty, a little like old metal and wood and mothballs. Figurines guarded the edges of the bookshelves, and there were other cabinets and shelves with toys there too. The TV had a stand with consoles on the bottom and video games arranged around there - he had tried to bring out the ones he thought Jeremy might like, then realized that he had absolutely no idea what those were, so he just settled for his favorites. You could hear the faint bangs of pots and pans from above them, the heavy stomp of his father’s feet, muffled and distant. Twisted hunks of metal were affixed to the wall in vaguely aesthetically pleasing patterns, projects from his metalworking class. A small cabinet made out of roughly hewn wood from his woodworking class held some lumpy attempts at glassblowing. 

It was crowded, pretty brickish, and splattered with Michael. His projects, his attempts, his time both well and badly spent. A cheap plastic table liberated from his grandmother’s house sat to the side, edged in old floral patterns, and cheap psychedelic tapestries battled with his grandmother’s quilts on the wall. There was a mannequin propped in the corner coated in his attempts at sewing for cosplays, which he wasn’t too great at yet. 

“It’s amazing,” Jeremy said. 

Something roared to life in Michael’s stomach, and he ducked his head to hide his smile. “Welcome to Casa de Michael. In that corner we have failed arts and crafts projects, and in this corner we have failed attempts at a life. But very successful attempts at video games.”

Michael set up their stuff on the old table as Jeremy wandered around, ghosting his fingers right in front of the knick-knacks but always just shy of touching, like it was an art museum. He squinted at one of Michael’s nicer metal sculptures. It was abstract, but it held the distinct sensation of ascending into the sky. “You made this?”

“I took a few summer courses. No biggie.” He shrugged, even though he knew Jeremy couldn’t see it, and flipped a pencil nervously in his hand. Was Jeremy seriously impressed by this stuff? It was just Michael’s basement. He licked his lips, then moved to stand a respectable yet close distance from Jeremy. He pointed to another sculpture next to it, this one a heavier thrashing ball of twisted metal that looked a little like a tumbleweed. “That was my final project. It makes me kind of nervous to look at it.”

“Totally,” Jeremy breathed. He perked up at the other bookshelves. “Hey, are those Green Lantern rings?”

“If by Green Lantern rings you mean Green Lantern rings, a Flash ring, and a Legion of Superheroes Ring then duh!”

It was a while before they actually got around to working on the project, with Jeremy constantly asking what that comic book was or what that figure was supposed to do. Michael agonized over how to explain Sailor Moon to a popular kid in a way that made him sound as heterosexual as possible without making it sound like he had it up for a creepy reason. Jeremy had nodded indulgently along with the explanation, and Michael couldn’t help but shake the impression that he already knew what it was. That was just an impression, though. 

They even talked a little more animatedly about the project. Jeremy’s work was perfection, as usual, and Michael even had a pretty good draft of the Powerpoint and script for the presentation. 

Eventually Michael’s Mom came downstairs to embarrass him further, and the minute her indoor slippers came thumping down the stairs Jeremy straightened. He had been leaning over, animatedly discussing Goody Proctor with Michael, but when she ducked down his expression rearranged itself. 

That was the best word for it - it rearranged itself, cooled down, and in a move Michael had seen a thousand times before he twisted his limbs into something cheerful and relaxed instead of animated and Jeremy. 

“Are you staying for dinner, Jeremy?” 

He smiled shyly, rubbing the back of his neck. “My dad’s making meatloaf. He gets on my case when I don’t finish my plate, so I better starve myself.” He grinned conspiratorially. “Only way I can actually eat it.”

Michael’s mother laughed appreciatively, before quickly saying in an aside to Michael in Tagalog, “Holy shit, you weren’t kidding. He’s straight from the white boy factory.”

Michael choked on his spit. After three seconds Jeremy choked on his spit too. “Mom, don’t be rude!”

“Honey, please. I’m never rude for free.” She winked at Jeremy. “You two have fun, now.”

They waved her weakly off as she ascended the stairs again. 

Jeremy watched her go, smiling slightly. “Your mom’s really cool.”’

“Ugh, she’s the worst.” Michael bent over his laptop, transcribing a few more lines of the text. He took a chance and asked, “Are your parents like that too?”

It was the wrong chance. Jeremy’s smile froze, practically perched on his face. “Not really. She reminds me of someone else who raised me, though. He’s really awesome.”

“Yeah?” Michael asked, intrigued despite himself. “Like your grandpa or something?”

“He’s really awesome.” Jeremy said, in the exact same tone of voice, with the exact same smile. 

“Okay,” Michael dragged out slowly, sensing dangerous waters. “Here, what do you think about this quote?”

They worked for a few hours after that, and Michael grew bored long before Jeremy did. Jeremy never seemed to get bored or tire, patiently working away at the paper with a quick yet methodical precision. It was like watching a Turing machine. 

The project was due tomorrow on Monday, but they wrapped it up in record time. Michael felt self-consciously useless, and he had the sense Jeremy had been allowing him to help as much as he was. The guy was legitimately some kind of super genius. 

By the time they had finished Michael was left anxiously bouncing his leg, almost afraid to bring it up again in case Jeremy had suddenly decided that it was lame. “So, you want to go home or you still up for those video games?”

Unbelievably, indescribably, irrevocably, Jeremy brightened. “Sure!”

Michael had a lot of video games, but he pulled out the greatest hits for this one. 

Zombiepocalypse was even better with a Player 2. He had never known that before. 

They didn’t make a very good team at first, as Jeremy had never even held an SNES controller and was deeply confused at the concept. Michael was forced to reach over and show him the proper grip, after which Jeremy somehow got even more clueless and had to have Michael help him find the shoulder buttons. Popular guys, honestly. 

He grunted a little whenever he defeated a zombie and hissed encouragements to himself under his breath as he played. He also occasionally muttered things like ‘Stop backseat playing!’ and ‘Japan makes the worst electronics’, which went under the very large weirdness file for Jeremy. 

After that was Smash Bros, which Jeremy also sucked at. 

“Is this the first time you’ve experienced getting owned? What’s it like? Are you dizzy?” Michael exaggeratedly reached out a hand as if to check Jeremy’s temperature, who laughed and batted him away. “Some slight nausea is a typical side effect of getting completely rekt.”

“I’m doing my best,” Jeremy laughed, mashing the b button for his Mewtwo. That was his first problem. “I’m going to wreck you next.”

“Dude, it’s rekt, not wreck.”

Jeremy squinted at him. “What’s the difference?”

Michael sighed. “Don’t worry about it, Prepmeister. Come on, we’re hitting Cornelia next.”

“Did you just call me Prepmeister?”

“Oh, I got more where that came from.” Michael began ticking off on his fingers, “Prepatory School, Prep II: Son of Prep, Preppin’ my way downtown, Prep me up inside.”

Jeremy gaped at him. “How many derogatory nicknames do you have for me?”

“You really don’t want me to answer that question.”

For half a second Michael worried that he had taken it too far when Jeremy stared at him with a perfectly blank expression, but he barely had enough time to freak out before Jeremy broke into a large grin and started laughing.

It was high and a little breathy, and not really like the laugh Michael had always heard from him, but that one wouldn’t have fit in the room. His school laugh was too big for Michael’s basement, too plastic for his metalworking and comic books, and it had transformed into something a little squeakier and a little more genuine. 

You would have never been able to tell the other one wasn’t genuine if you hadn’t heard this one.

Finally, in a deference to how Jeremy had caged that he had played Halo a couple of times, he pulled up Steam to open Super Shooter Sublimation 2. 

This time Jeremy gasped happily. “Rich plays this game sometimes!”

It shouldn’t have been startling, but the idea of Jeremy and Rich playing video games together threw him for a loop. There weren’t any Doritos eaten with chopsticks, three am Xbox Live shit talking sessions and impassioned forum rants in that video gaming session. There probably wasn’t even any Mountain Dew. What was gaming without Mountain Dew?

Finally he knew who was going on Xbox live and calling him a faggot. 

He glanced at Jeremy out of the corner of his eye, who was bumbling around the main menu adorably trying to figure out the buttons. He sighed and reached over, laboriously explaining the buttons and ammo system to Jeremy, who apparently was the strictest casual on the strictest casual Halo game. He was so out of his element. 

Calling up a two person map so they could play against each other, a feature Michael had never even used before, he caught Jeremy shifting awkwardly in his dusty bean bag from the corner before he froze, staring at the screen in complete and total shock. 

Michael checked the screen. It was definitely just the beginner’s map for Super Shooter Sublimation 2. 

“Holy fuck,” Jeremy breathed, “you’re Pell Mell?”

Wait, what? That was his gaming handle. Sure enough, when Michael glanced at the bottom of the screen his handle and points were displayed, as well as a list of his friends. In a horrible burst of suspicion, Michael clicked open the friends list. 

“Why do you know my gaming handle?” Michael asked cautiously. 

“You’re the number one player on the server,” Jeremy said, eyes wide. He turned to Michael, practically gaping. “You won the tournament last month!”

“I skipped school for it,” Michael said automatically. “Also, wait. What?”

“I’m Robot Jones,” Jeremy said excitedly. “We’ve - we talk online sometimes!”

Holy shit, that was Jeremy!

Robot Jones - technically, Robot_jones - was a random player on the local server who messaged him out of the blue one day with a ‘gg’ and they bonded over shit. They still talked sometimes, mainly just about life crap and venting about whatever. Robot_jones hated most of his friends and holy fuck!

“Robot Jones is not a casual,” Michael hissed, “Robot Jones is a very good player!”

Jeremy was still staring at him, jaw slack. His pupils were dilated. “I can’t believe this. You’re one of the top players on the server.”

“Like, duh? I’m me.” Michael’s chest swelled at the praise from Jeremy - Jeremy, who was impressed by him! - but the implications rapidly caught up with him. “I can’t believe I’ve been talking with you online. What are the chances of that? You’re...you’re actually a nice guy!”

“You’re not a loser!” Jeremy exclaimed. He faltered. “I mean, you’re still a hopeless loser nerd, but you’re good at video games!”

“Hell yeah I am!” Michael shouted back. “You better believe it, Heere! I’m a loser nerd who is fucking awesome at video games!”

“I believe you!” Jeremy laughed. “I admit it! Michael Mell is a loser nerd who is awesome at video games!”

“Fucking awesome!”

“Michael Mell is fucking awesome!”

They laughed together hysterically, Jeremy’s hand on his forehead and practically wheezing, and Michael’s chest was bursting with a vibrant white light. It felt like a heartbeat, it was making his head spin, it was soft and squishy and made him choke up and want to cry. 

He wanted to make Jeremy Heere laugh like that every day, really laugh. He didn’t want Jeremy Heere to be sad anymore, because Jeremy was making him so happy. 

Then Jeremy sobered. The happiness fell off, the drawbridge was drawn up and his eyes glazed over. He was completely still. Michael faltered too, still chuckling to himself, and wiped his sweaty palms on his jeans before picking up the controller again. 

“You want to go again for another round? Now that you aren’t pretending you’ve never played this game before?” What was with that, actually?

Jeremy only stood up, face blank. “I have to go to the bathroom.”

Michael blinked up at him. “Uh. Okay? I’ll keep the game paused for you.”

He practically ran up the stairs. 

He was gone for a while. It was probably just Michael being restless, or freaking out mentally about how happy Jeremy made him, or just the general stress of Jeremy existing in his safe space at all. 

An abandoned comic book that escaped the cleaning spree was sitting tucked under Michael’s bean bag, and he started flipping through it waiting for Jeremy to get back. His heart was still beating triple time. 

What did this mean? Did it mean Jeremy wasn’t horrible anymore?

Maybe people were complicated. It had been easier to think of him as simply satanic yet attractive. It was easy to pigeonhole Jeremy. He practically wanted you to. Michael had always thought that being the most popular boy in school was just a natural expression of himself, as if he had defined the term and reality took a while to catch up to him and build his empire. 

Playing video games and thinking comic books were cool shouldn’t have been a flaw. It was what made a person a person. It was just that Jeremy had never had that luxury. People didn’t want a person, they wanted Jeremy Heere. Even Michael did. 

Michael had seen Jeremy pull some pretty horrible stuff. He made girls cry, made lives miserable, stood by and in some cases even encouraged Rich to physically abuse people. He snickered at every mean joke and stepped over anyone and everyone to get what he wanted, which he always already had. Liking video games didn’t make that stuff go away. 

It just meant that maybe he could not be a bad person, if he really wanted to. Maybe, if Michael tried hard enough...he could try and help Jeremy. 

Him, help Jeremy. It was ridiculous. How could he help the most popular boy in school, the boy who had everything? What could Michael give him?

The sad fact of the matter was that the first time Michael saw Jeremy, he saw somebody who was unhappy. Michael, who was unforgivably himself, didn’t like to see people sad. He had wanted to help him back then. When had that fallen away?

When the door opened Michael realized for the first time that on some level he wasn’t expecting Jeremy to come back, that he had ditched all of his belongings and booked it far away from Michael, who had heard his true laugh. Another starburst of happiness lit inside him, as if he was a dog and had no object permanence or something. 

“Do you want to go back to it?” Michael called. “Now that you’ve revealed your deceit you have to actually try this time.”

But Jeremy didn’t walk towards his beanbag. He walked towards Michael’s, standing far too close, and he squatted down to look him straight in the eyes. His hair, teeth, skin, everything was perfect except for his wild eyes. 

“I hope you appreciate how hard it was to convince him to let me do this.”

“Uh?” 

Jeremy began shucking his flannel, talking casually the whole time as he folded it up neatly and put it next to the beanbag. “We’re lucky he was in a good mood today. Just remember that you’re telling nobody about this.”

“Wait,” Michael said, brain a spinning hamster wheel with nowhere to go, “what? Who’s he?”

“Nobody can know about this. You speak a single word about this you’re dead.” Jeremy reached out a hand and grabbed Michael by this chin, not cupping his face so much as gripping it. “Do you understand me? I can make your life miserable, Mell. You tell anybody about this I’m ruining your life.”

“What?” Michael asked, inanely. 

“Just lie back and have a good time.” He sighed, screwing his eyes shut and opening them again. He looked determined, like he was going off to war and Michael was waving his handkerchief. “I’m just doing this because you’re hot, gay, and amazing at Super Shooter Sublimation 2. Now that was fucking hot. Don’t make anything else of this.”

The rolling hamster wheel of his brain caught onto the word ‘hot’. His brain immediately jumped to a very improbable place. 

Jeremy gently pushed Michael down on the bean bag and reached for his fly. “If you tell anyone you’re dead.”

“Wait,” Michael said, “what?”

  
  
  
  


Long after Jeremy gathered his things, kissed Michael goodbye, and left through the front door, Michael was still lying on his bean bag in a daze. 

Holy shit. 

It was like someone had cracked his brain in half, put all the pieces in a box, shook up the box, and dumped it on the table, which was on fire. Nothing made sense anymore. The world was spinning. His universe had been cracked in half and Jeremy Heere had wielded the hammer and speaking of hammer oh my fucking god - 

He was a different person now. His life had shifted. He had entered a new stage. 

Michael...was a man.

What was going on? The world was no longer the world anymore. His basement, with his nerd crap and bad art and squishy beanbags, was no longer his basement. He would literally never be able to look at this bean bag the same way again. This was like a bad porno or something. No, it was a great porno. The best porno. The porno from God. 

Then his mom called him up for dinner. 

He sat at the dining room table, his mother in front of him, his father to the side. He ate his adobo over rice and listened to his parents talk about the newest artists his father, a manager at a record label, was working with. His father had taught him how to sing. 

He felt like singing now. He felt like skipping. He felt like there was a giant poster hung around his neck that said exactly what had happened two hours ago and that there was no way his parents couldn’t see it. He felt like a criminal. He felt like a god. 

“How did your project go with Jeremy?” His mom asked, spooning more rice into her mouth. 

Oh god, she knew. She totally knew. Act natural, Michael!

“It was awesome!” Michael said loudly. “We played video games and talked about seventeenth century puritans! Lots of puritanism!”

His parents looked at him strangely. Michael shoved more adobo into his mouth so they couldn’t ask him any more questions. 

“Love me some puritans,” His mother said agreeably. “Are you feeling alright, Michael?”

“I have no secrets!”

“I have no rice,” His father said mournfully. 

His mother silently held out her bowl for his father to take with him to the kitchen and get seconds. Michael, through eating as much food as possible so nobody would talk to him ever, held out his plate for seconds too. 

As his parents chatted with each other, his mother twisted around in her seat to shout at his father in the kitchen, Michael surreptitiously drew out his phone. The latin legal terms sounded funny interspersed in the Tagalog, but it was something Michael had always associated with her. A mess of contradictions. 

He frantically opened up his internet browser, closed out of it, opened it again, then closed it and opened up his incognito browser.

Very carefully, he typed in ‘am I a virgin’.

He scanned the results. Gross, and way too hetersexual. Vaginas were so gross. So...wet.

He typed in, ‘virgin gay’

Ew. 

‘Virgin gay blowjobs.’

More porn! Not right now, phone. Today Michael has had something better. 

After some more fastidious googling he found that the answer was ‘it depends’. Some people said that butt stuff was the only way to go (ew!) and some people were just like, ‘you lose your virginity when you’re truly intimate with someone you love and are close to.’

Michael faltered over the phone.

Very, very carefully, he typed in ‘friends with benefits’ into the phone. 

Was he a virgin? Being gay was hard. Nobody ever told you what was going on and what to do if the hottest, most popular guy in school gave you a blowjob and told you not to tell anyone. 

He pinched himself. Not dreaming. 

“We have to leave for mass in two hours.” His mother turned back around and accepted the new bowl of rice from his father, who also laid one in front of Michael. “If you’re actually planning on attending, Michael?”

Oh, god. 

“Jesus is real,” Michael said, feeling the truth with all his heart. “Jesus is real and he is with us, Mom. He works miracles through us. Hallelujah.”

His father beamed, then said in English, “That’s the spirit. Ha, holy spirit! Great pun.”

His mother narrowed his eyes. “If you’re having religious delusions then you can stay home from church, honey.”

It was going to be hideously awkward, but he did owe this one to Jesus. Thank you, Jesus. He was a wingman. 

“You know,” Michael said, “things are different for me now. Everything’s different.”

Somehow his mother managed to stuff rice in her mouth and side-eye him at the same time. “Uh huh.”

“A new light has shone on my world, Mom.”

“Undoubtedly.”

“My life has meaning now, is all.”

She sighed gustily, putting down her fork in favor of picking up a spoon to throw at Michael’s head. He yelped. “What did I say about eating dinner high, Michael!”

“I didn’t - ow!”

His dad shrugged. “Let him waste his youth. He’s not so bad. When I was his age -”

“Dad!” Another spoon. “Ow, Mom!”

Some things were the same. Other things were different. 

Michael got his first kiss after he lost his virginity (maybe). He lost his virginity to someone he liked but who didn’t like him back (maybe?). Everything was confusing. 

But for tonight, he let it be really fucking awesome. 

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It hasn't been explicitly stated yet, but since the original book took place 10 years from when the book was published this story also takes place 10 years from when the play was made - so the year is 2025. It doesn't make a lot of practical difference except for the fact that Michael's obsession with retro gaming becomes even weirder. It's like he's a Pong fanatic. Pretend that this is a creative choice instead of a gross misunderstanding of the play.

It was hard not to feel like the king of the school when he rolled in on Monday, report stashed neatly into his backpack. He was part of an exclusive club now. Michael was an adult. That was totally how that worked.

There was something else stashed in his backpack too, something that was burning a hole through it. Jeremy had left behind his flannel shirt, accidentally stashed under a bean bag and only found once Michael was anxiously cleaning up the area, and it would have been way too creepy to keep it in his house.

Or would it have been a good excuse? ‘Hey, Jeremy, you forgot your flannel. You want to come and...take it back?’

Maybe he could just text him and have them meet in an abandoned corner of the school. Except Michael didn’t have his number.

He paused walking and exhaled, letting the unwashed masses of the public high school flow past him as they waited for school to begin. He didn’t even have his phone number.

It was stupid. He was in literally the most ideal situation known to man. If, hypothetically, Jeremy had been a woman, a horrible waste of a perfectly good Jeremy, and he had been allowed to tell anybody about it, he would practically be the new Overlord God King of the entire Yugioh club. But Jeremy was a guy, a guy who Michael hadn’t even known was bisexual until he...yeah, and was extremely closeted. Extremely, extremely closeted.

Again, it was stupid. Michael couldn’t exactly say that he wanted his first time to be with someone special. He had been just trying to manage the first time part. But he was such a romantic it was honestly pretty embarrassing, and on some level he really did want to do it with someone special. Someone he was actually dating.

On the other hand, counterpoint: Jeremy fucking Heere!

Michael was so high on his own success that the jocks had caught him completely off guard.

His locker had been cleaned off over the weekend, thank God, and Michael whistled a jaunty tune as he started stashing his paper bag lunch. He even uncrumpled Christian Bale and securely fixed it to the door with a magnet, nodding professionally at his masculine glower and full lips. Best Batman.

Then the locker door slammed on his fingers, and Michael bit off a yelp as he withdrew his hand and clutched it to his chest. A big, weirdly meaty hand had jammed his locker shut, and when Michael followed it he saw a grinning Kyle in front of him.

Great. The warm glow in his chest was packing itself away on the next train for Ohio, and he was left with the unfortunate reality of the fact that he had ran his mouth off yet again and he was going to get into major trouble.

“I gave you the weekend to think over what you said,” Kyle breathed, and Michael forced himself to keep still. “Regret it yet?”

“I had other stuff on my mind this weekend,” Michael said truthfully. “Can I get an extension?”

“Hilarious, Mell.” Kyle stepped closer and Michael finally had to step back, and when he stepped back again he bumped up against a body. The lizard part of his brain was impressed, but his frontal lobe was more concerned with the fact that it was Henry, and that Henry was grinning down at him. “Let’s take a walk.”

“I’m going to be late for class,” Michael said stupidly. Henry grabbed onto his left arm, hard enough to make Michael wince. “No, not my perfect attendance record! It’s all I have left!”

They dragged him around a corner, Michael frantically trying to dig his heels in to try and make it a little more obvious that he was being physically dragged away to the guillotine here. But he was in the same situation as last time, already five minutes into first period, and teachers were taking attendance as any vagrant students stayed away if they knew what was good for them. He was alone, and Michael’s life was back to normal. Joy.

He was forcibly escorted slash dragged to a musty stairwell and out a rusty side exit with a squeaking door, and Michael’s heart rate steadily began rising and rising. They were going to kill him. His mother would never forgive herself. His father was going to make a bad pun in English at his funeral and then cry a lot. This wasn’t how he wanted to go out. He began thrashing harder, but he only hurt himself more.

The panic was steadily beginning to rise in this throat, and his eyes were starting to swim with tunnel vision. When he was pulled out of the side exit into an alleyway on the side of the school, where the running track extended through the back to make a loop around the campus, he almost missed the fact that Jeremy and Rich were leaning against the brick wall of the school, talking quietly.

He was so shocked, and still being dragged by angry jocks, and so caught up in the memory of the last time he saw Jeremy he didn’t think before speaking. “Jeremy, help!”

Rich’s eyes widened almost imperceptibly. The jocks let go of him. Jeremy was bored, and a little disgusted.

“The hell are you two doing?”

“You were there when Mell was talking shit about me,” Kyle demanded. “You know I’m skipping my math test this period and I got nothing better to do.”

“I’m in gym,” Henry sneered. “This is exercise, ain’t it?” Jeremy rolled his eyes, face cool and blank. Michael felt his heart drop down to his feet.

They didn’t have to date. Michael got that, he was cool with it. He didn’t know what Jeremy’s home life was like, even if his super cool guardian person would be okay with it. That was even putting aside all the petty high school social status shit. He should have known it extended to everything else, to a genuine laugh or a video game. He should have known that.

“Get a life, you two.” He turned his back on Michael, waving an absent hand as Rich laughed that high pitched, obnoxious bellow he always had. His gaze swept straight over Michael, past and through him. “If you want help in math you just gotta ask, dude.”

Kyle, amazingly, flustered and started mumbling at the floor. “I can handle it.”

“Come on, I know the coach is putting pressure on you. I want to help, I’m your friend.” He schooled his features into something distantly encouraging, a masculine sort of friendship. They were completely ignoring Michael and the fact that poor Kyle was currently engaged in attempted homicide. “Just let me know next time, okay? This is a judgement free zone.”

“Yeah,” Kyle said, bolstered. “Totally!”

“Great.” Jeremy clapped Rich on the back. “Come on, Mrs. Nichols’ll kill me if I’m late.”

“She wants to bang you, man, no way she’ll care,” Rich snickered. Michael flinched, and he knew that Jeremy saw it. “I’ll catch up in a sec, bro. Remember what I said.”

“How can I forget?” Jeremy said dryly, and after that unbelievably banal exchange Jeremy turned on his heel and left, hands jammed in his pockets.

His situation had now, with the unexpected addition of Rich, gotten a whole lot worse. Michael was deeply screwed over, he was definitely going to get punched, but all he could think about was how Jeremy looked through him. He wasn’t averting his eyes or pretending he wasn’t there. He was furniture.

This was the guy he lost his virginity (maybe) to?

It all felt like some kind of sick joke. At least last time he had somehow made them back off. Now because of Heere’s fucking internalized homophobia and shame and vapid, shallow ass friends he’s screwing Michael over. That pointless status and feeling of superiority that he desperately needed to keep because his self-esteem was so fucking low meant he was leaving Michael out to dry.

God, he was so stupid.

“Jeremy’s such a nice guy,” Henry said, impressed.

“Totally,” Kyle agreed, cracking his knuckles. “Anyway, Mell, you ready to fucking die?”

“Too late,” Michael said. Jeremy had beaten them to it.

But Rich was bouncing on the balls of his feet, grinning madly. Rich was pretty much perpetually high on something, and it was usually pretty obvious. The guy grinned and laughed and bounced and did weird things with his body that made Michael both uncomfortable and uncomfortably aroused like there was no tomorrow. Energy leaked out of his ears. The worse the situation, the brighter he got.

He was practically giggling now. He was cracking his knuckles with Kyle, and it sunk in for Michael that there were three jocks standing over him with a death wish. Well, it hadn’t been the first time. Wouldn’t be the last. Christ.

“What a fucking riot,” Rich said. “Honestly, I love it. Classic story, tale as old as time here. This is killing me. You’re killing me, Mell, I’m dying here. I’m fucking dead here, Mell, this is such a riot.” He laughed again, and even Kyle and Henry looked uncomfortable. “Bros. Homies. Dudes. Muscleheaded faggots. Get a fucking clue.”

Then he socked Kyle in the jaw.

He had to reach up to do it, ridiculous muscles flexing in the shadows of the school building as their feet crunched on gravel. Kyle fell straight onto his ass, and the heel of his palms dug into the gravel as he gaped like a moron, touching his hand to his jaw as if he couldn’t believe what happened. Henry cursed, stepping away from Michael as if the crazy was contagious. Rich flexed his arm, pulling an exaggerated ‘yow!’ face, grinning down and up and forwards and backwards.

“Hey, man,” Henry said quickly, and Michael realized that even Rich’s friends were scared of him. “I don’t want no trouble. Come on, just tell us what’s wrong. You having one of your weird episodes again? Is that it?”

Episodes? Kyle was picking himself back up, still gaping, keeping a healthy distance from Rich and Michael both. The two other jocks had backed off, and Rich was shaking out his arms and huffing as Michael realized that he was standing far closer to him than he was to the other boys, as if he was chasing them off through sheer proximity.

“Listen up, chucklefuck homies.” He clapped his hands, then pointed at Michael. “I hate Michael Mell more than anyone else fucking alive! He’s such a piece of shit he has no clue the kind of trouble he’s in. He’s my bitch now, fuckity fucks. So fuck off!”

Kyle and Henry looked at each other, flabbergasted. Kyle hesitantly offered up, “You want us to go away?”

“Isn’t that what I just said?” Rich said impatiently. He made little shooing motions. “Go home. I got a nerd to do my math homework for me now.”

They went, and Michael almost missed them.

Rich was fucking insane, everybody knew that. Ever since Heere had showed up he had cheerfully fallen in line as a lackey, but nothing could tame how much of a Chaotic Evil he was. Michael had once seen him physically rip a sink out of a wall because the grout on it was bugging him. Heere and Jake were practically the only people who could even remotely get him to stop being a psycho, and that was including the administrators and the Principal.

Of course, the only reason Heere and Jake were good at getting him to stop being a psycho was because Jake was the most easy going guy ever and only ever shrugged and gave Rich a ‘boys will be boys’ attitude. Meanwhile, Heere was a fucking douchebag.

The minute they left Rich didn’t so much as sober as dial himself back, no longer obligated to keep his fur fluffed up to make himself look bigger. His expression changed from demented glee to -

He grabbed Michael’s shirt and shoved him up against the wall. Michael grunted as the back of his head collided with the brick hard, shoving back and up a little, and his breath caught as the wind was knocked out of him.

“This was,” Michael gasped, “more intimidating the first time.”

Every emotion of Rich’s trailed back to the same thing. A good mood on Rich meant nothing. A bad mood meant nothing. Anger was almost safer than happiness.

What marred Rich’s expression now meant nothing so long as Rich’s hands were trembling. It was miniscule, almost unnoticeable, but someone tended to get a little hyper aware of someone’s movements when they were about to get punched. Michael was breathing hard and fast, biting down on the fear and refusing to give Rich a scared target. He’s be a sarcastic asshole until the day he died, goddammit.

Even if that day was today. Well, at least he could say that he hadn’t died a virgin (maybe).

But Rich’s eyes were wide and assessing, and they looked up and down Michael with such intensity he felt pried apart. Rich was looking for something, but Michael didn’t know if either of them knew what it was.

He was truly holding his breath now, and he got the sense that Rich was too. He was wide eyed, head cocked, almost like a curious monkey if the monkey happened to be a silverback gorilla.

When he finally spoke it was with a quiet, reasoned tone Michael had never heard from him before. The strange sincerity was so startling he almost missed what he had said. “What does he see in you?”

Michael choked, more than he already was.

“What does who see in me?” Michael squeaked, fighting harder against Rich’s grip even as it only tightened. “What, Kyle? I think he sees an asshole, he fucking hates me. Thanks a lot for that, by the way, I really - ow!”

“Shut up,” Rich said casually, “you know who I mean. What did you do, huh? Bat your eyes at him? Lohst threw herself at him for a month before he gave in. He shouldn’t even know who the fuck you are.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Michael said shakily. “You’re insane. You’re insane and - and you hate me. Why do you hate me?”

It was a stupid question, and Rich threw him a look that said as much. He didn’t need a reason to hate him. Rich was Rich and Michael was Michael, and while they weren’t exactly the Montagues and the Capulets someone like Rich could only ever hate someone like Michael. He was inherently the aggressor, the bully, and Michael was inherently the guy people just walked all over and pretended they liked and played video games with and then just left him out to dry.

“Jeremy, fuckhole.” He shook Michael a little, and he cringed as his head bounced off the wall again. He was going to get a concussion at this rate. “What the fuck did you do, offer to suck his dick in the bathroom?”

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Michael cried, trying to protect his head by ducking it down. “I don’t even know Heere, christ!”

“You’ve been stalking him for months, don’t play games with me!”

“Does anybody actually know Heere?” Michael cried, and Rich abruptly quieted and fell short. His grip relaxed a fraction, but it was enough for Michael to pull himself away, panting. His head was killing him, but although it might have been the adrenaline it wasn’t nearly as bad as it should have been. “I don’t know what your damage is, but keep me fucking out of it! I’ll do your math homework or whatever you want, just stop making up shit.” He shook his head, almost stumbling. “I don’t know Heere.”

Rich stepped back, and normal human emotions and feelings and body language must truly have meant nothing to him because he broke out into a wide smile. All smiles, all friendliness, he clapped Michael on the back and laughed. Michael stumbled, both from the dizziness and from the mood whiplash. “You’re trying to tell me that he ditched you to get pummelled by some airhead jocks and you’re still protecting him? You’re a riot and a half, Mell!”

Wait, was that approval?

“Was that,” Michael rasped, “a fucking test?”

Rich gave him a thumbs up and a toothy smile, all intimidating and evil. “I owe Jeremy five dollars, you asshole.”

Christ.

“Jeremy was in on this.” Michael scrubbed his face in his hands, beating back any tears before they came. His heart was still jackrabbiting, and they were still hiding in the shadows of the school. He was totally missing homeroom. “Did Jeremy ask you to beat me up?”

“Nah, he was trying to convince me that you were a good sort and that we should leave you alone,” Rich said plainly. “I thought he was full of shit so I decided to beat you up.”

That was a special kind of logic that only Rich could ever decipher, but when you took the fact that Rich was completely batshit insane into account it made perfect sense. Of course Jeremy trying to have sleepover talk with his best friend resulted in said best friend trying to beat him up.

It also resulted in said best friend saving him from other jocks trying to beat him up, and presumably from any jock in the near future who was looking at the possibility of beating him up.

It would have been almost helpful if Rich hadn’t actually been the only one to actually follow through on beating him up. What the fuck was with this guy?

None of that was important. Michael was stupid, and a romantic, and he had fallen for the wrong guy. He couldn’t help himself from asking, “Did Jeremy ask you to do this? To - rescue me through being awful or whatever?”

Rich stared at him, then stared and stared, to the extent that Michael was beginning to squirm. The question wasn’t that weird. The short boy, with his rippling muscles and gelled hair and ragged bloodshot eyes hiding in the shadow of a suburban high school stared at him, and Michael knew instinctively he was looking into the eyes of someone who wasn’t like him.

“Why would he do that?”

The incredulity was gone. Rich made sense now, so much as he ever could. Michael settled for shaking his head dumbly. “That’s what you do when you care about someone, Rich. You help them when they ask for help. Even if you - if you can’t show it right then.” He swallowed and took a chance. “I know that if you care about someone you think you have to hide it behind always being a bully. It might be easier to help him if you knew that you don’t have to do that.”

Rich stared at him again, breathing deeply. Michael rubbed the back of his head gingerly, and then his arms. They were a little tender. He hoped that they wouldn’t bruise.

Just as he was rubbing at them Rich grabbed them, clenching tight enough to make Michael bit back a shout, and if they hadn’t bruised before they were now. He tugged Michael in closer until he could feel Rich’s breath on his face, a position he had no desire to be in. “Listen here, you little shit,” he exhaled. “You’re an adult so you act like it. Don’t sit around waiting for your big bad boyfriend to save you. Jeremy’s not going to help you because Jeremy and I live in the real world, not whatever fantasy Candyland you have cooked up where a knight in shining armor comes to rescue you from your own big mouth. You talk big you get hit. That’s the real fucking world, Mell.”

“Dude,” Michael said, putting his big mouth to use, “sorry your dad beats you but don’t take it out on me.”

It was way over the line, even for normal people, and Rich stilled, huffing deep and loud breaths. His eyes were glossed over and he looked far away, and Michael knew that he was right. It explained a little, but excused nothing. Then again, Michael wasn’t in his position, and it was hard to make a value judgement from where he stood.

Oh, wait! It was super easy! Because Rich was a fucking psycho!

“My mother loves me,” Rich breathed, “and she does what she has to. Jeremy does what he has to. I do what I have to. You don’t understand that, Mell.” He shook his arm, and in his dizziness Michael stumbled back. “Get your head out of your own ass. Maybe you aren’t the only one who needs help. You want to talk about fear?” He leaned in, and Michael was sucked into his dilated eyes, ragged at the edges and bloodshot. “You were given the keys to the fucking kingdom here. That’s what I mean by fear. You’re the only one in this sad pantomime who has all the information, all the cards. You take responsibility. You’re the only one who can help. We need you, Michael!”

Then Rich screamed, gritting his teeth and screaming through his hands, and he bent double. Michael threw himself back, distantly aware that he was having one of his weird seizures again, not caring. He turned tail and ran, burst through the doors and up through the stairwell, ran until he had nabbed his abandoned backpack by his locker and skidded into class twenty minutes late, home safe.

It wasn’t until the next period that he remembered that he still had English with Jeremy.

Everything was too much today. He had been intending on eating lunch alone but he had ended up sitting next to Wilson with the Yugioh guys again, playing Mario Kart 4DS again, making the horses hump each other again. Again and again. Everything stayed the same except for Michael, whose life had gotten way too exciting lately.

Rich was honestly scary. Not scary in the ‘he’s going to beat me up, oh no’ sense, but in the sense that you genuinely think that he should be in the mental institution. He’s not right. That stuff he was saying earlier was all paranoid ramblings.

It calmed him down. Things were fine and back to the way they had been at least a few days ago. Rich was a nut. Jeremy had...secretly wanted to help him, maybe.

Did it matter? He had ended up rescuing Michael in the end. It shouldn’t matter that he had to do it so underhandedly, through somebody as scary as Rich. So long as he secretly cared, probably, and that he did something about it, kinda, it shouldn’t have mattered how.

It shouldn’t, but it did.

“Dude, you look half-dead.” Wilson poked him with a cold and soggy french fry, which he then proceeded to stuff in his mouth. It mashed around in his braces. Gross. “How’s Heere patrol going?”

“Oh, you know,” Michael said glumly, “he’s still Satan.”

Drake rolled his eyes from further down the table. “Fucking man up and admit you want to sleep with him. I mean, I’m not saying he’s hot. I’m not gay. But if I were gay,” he empathetically pointed his stylus at Michael, “I’d be all over that shit. Hotness has no morality.”

“Yeah,” Ben piped up, “Chloe Valentine is so fucking hot and she’s still evil.”

“See?” Drake nodded wisely. “It’s normal. Just accept that it’s never going to happen and move on.”

Despite everything, despite Rich, despite jocks, despite promise after promise, Michael smiled.

Yeah. It was still awesome.

By the time that Michael slipped into English and dived for his seat in the back he was feeling as good as he could possibly feel considering the fact that he had gotten slammed against a wall that morning and that he had a new FWB who refused to acknowledge him in public. He slunk down across the aisle from a Drake who was already drifting off at his desk, playing around on his phone and not bothering to pretend to pay attention.

There wasn’t even a lecture. The teacher called for them to get into their groups to get ready for their presentation for the next five minutes, and Michael perked up as he remembered that Jeremy couldn’t get around pretending he didn’t exist now. They had the perfect excuse to talk. Maybe through the presentation they could finally, you know, touch base. Talk about video games again or something.

Jeremy, who had been lingering in the front of the room laughing with Jenna and some others, finally peeled away from them as they separated into their groups. He straightened as Jeremy sauntered easily over to his desk, dropping his stuff on top and sliding into the chair.

He found himself flushing as he remembered Sunday. Jeremy had been so casual about it, and lounging in his chair he was still casual. Michael tried not to wonder how many times he had done it. Everybody knew that he had on again, off again things with Brooke and Chloe, but it hadn’t felt like his first time with a guy. Michael didn’t know, just like he didn’t know Jeremy’s phone number.

“Hi,” Michael said, looking at the desk. “So, uh….”

“I think we’ve prepared pretty well for the presentation, but let’s go over our notecards again anyway,” Jeremy said smoothly, and Michael fought back a wince at the loftiness and precision of his voice. He had never played video games in his life. “You handle the first five slides and I’ll handle the last five.”

“Jeremy,” Michael said weakly, “look, I -”

“I want an A, Mell,” Jeremy drawled, “I have a GPA to keep up.”

Drake was asleep at the table across from them, or pretending.

“Yeah,” Michael said, “yeah.”

They memorized in silence, Jeremy the picture of a bored genius flipping through his notes. Michael was the picture of a flustered gay teen sitting at the table with the hottest, most popular guy in school who had totally given him a blowjob the day before. It had only been a day. A day!

He tried not to stare at him and totally failed. His hands, his cheekbones, his cool gaze flipping through his notes. Was he looking at Michael too? He totally had to be. No, wait, he totally wasn’t. Maybe he was looking out of the corner of his eye. Michael, who was also looking at Jeremy out of the corner of his eye, wouldn’t have been able to tell.

Michael beat down his wild imagination with a stick. No, he was horrible. Mean and ditchy and cold. No thinking nice things about bad men. Stop.

The flannel sat in his backpack, neatly folded. A postcard had been slipped inside.

They executed the presentation flawlessly. They really had been working hard on it, and everything Jeremy touched turned to gold - except, apparently, Michael.

Then it was over. That was it. Jeremy was breathtaking and amazing and cold and fickle and he had moved back to his own oasis of beauty and sunshine in the front of the room, leaving Michael in the shadows.

He slowly withdrew the post card from his backpack. This was probably a bad idea, but Michael was nothing but bad ideas stuffed inside a jacket and fed a slushie.

When Jeremy walked back over to give Michael his peer evaluation worksheet, which Michael had no idea how he was going to fill out, Michael accepted the worksheet and he slid the postcard into Jeremy’s hand. It was subtle. Nobody could have seen.

Jeremy’s eyebrows skyrocketed up as he caught sight of the postcard, and Michael saw him hold an inhale as he looked at it. He looked down at it, then up at Michael, lost.

Michael couldn’t hold back a smile. “Wish you were Heere.”

He whirled away as briskly as he had came, calling easily to his friends at the other side of the room. Michael leaned back in his chair, folding his arms behind his back and stretching out with a smirk on his face.

God, he was smooth.

When they filed out Jeremy proved himself a master at slight of hand - Michael had barely even seen Jeremy brush against his binder before it was sitting between his notes. He kept it in his binder, afraid to look at it, but kept it clutched to his chest as he skipped stopping by his locker to flee the school.

When he was far enough away he poured the post card out of the binder, heart beating fast. He hadn’t wanted it, so he gave it back. Maybe. It was better than him throwing it away, right? Right?

Wish You Were He(e)re! On the front. Michael flipped it over. On the back, it read -

‘Meet me at your car after school.’

Michael ran.

His car wasn’t parked in the front parking lot, but nearer to the back parking lot where the teachers usually parked. It made it easier to find a spot, even if it was a little farther away. He had no idea how Jeremy knew that he usually parked there, or how he knew that it was a relatively secluded spot that was more secluded now that kids were filing out faster and faster, but as Michael slowed down just enough to make it seem like he had walked there he saw Jeremy leaning against his crappy PT Cruiser, boat shoe propped against the tan finish, playing on his phone.

When Jeremy heard him walk up his head snapped up, and his eyes were bright and wide and tinged with something softer. Almost as soft as yesterday, but not quite.

Michael silently unzipped his backpack and held out Jeremy’s flannel shirt, tucking the postcard back inside it, and Jeremy accepted it dumbly. Michael’s hands brushed his as he passed it over. “Rich has a big mouth,” he said quietly.

Jeremy just clutched the shirt to his chest, looking far away. Michael waited.

He hadn’t been crazy. He had never been crazy. Rich had confirmed it, in a way that may have been on accident but that Michael was afraid was on purpose. Jeremy needed help. And only Michael could give it to him.

Whatever that help was, whatever he was in trouble from, could come later.

Very carefully, Jeremy stored the shirt back in his backpack. It wouldn’t have gone with the Vineyard Vines. He crossed his arms and practically lounged against the car, looking Michael up and down. He was somber, tinged with an edge of coldness.

“I’m pretty pissed at you,” Michael said finally.

“Don’t talk to me in school,” Jeremy said flatly. “That’s a rule. I’ll help you out, Michael, but nobody can find this out.”

“Two guys can be friends, you know,” Michael panned. “No homo.”

Jeremy looked away, working his jaw. “Not you and me. I can’t be associating with a - you know.” He ducked his head, ashamed. “You know.”

Something tight and hot trashed in Michael’s chest, but it felt more like his metal sculpture than actual rage. Cold and hard but mostly sad, all edges. “Yeah,” Michael said, exhausted. “I know.”

Then Jeremy smiled, and he leaned in. “Want me to make it up to you?”

He hadn’t lied about being pissed. This situation was bullshit. This was a thoroughly bad idea. Friends with benefits never worked when one party had a big stinking crush and the other one had severe internalized homophobia and was quite possibly in some serious trouble.

Jeremy Heere was Machiavellian, narcissistic, and evil, and under no circumstances should Michael ever sleep with him.

“Oh yeah,” Michael breathed.

Jeremy grinned, let Michael take three tries to unlock the door with shaking hands, and pulled them both in.

  
  


Two weeks, too many and not enough secret meet-ups, and five levels of Zombiepocalypse later, Michael leaned against the counter of the mutant 7/11 sucking at a slushie and marvelling at his life.

The convenience store was the same as ever, even if Michael had changed. Old men shuffled in and ping ponged from the counter to the beer fridge and back to the counter again before they shuffled out. Tired mothers in fast food uniforms gathered microwave dinners in their arms as their kids kicked at each other’s heels. That weird kid was back, and had impossibly managed to score himself a girlfriend. Spiraling hot dogs ground against a lukewarm heater, and Dana slung groceries even as she gave Michael the side-eye.

“You’ve been in a good mood.”

“An appropriate mood,” Michael corrected, “for my extraordinary, beautiful, magnificent life.”

“Don’t forget egotistical.”

“I thank the Savior for my blessings,” Michael said loudly, “and for the gifts he has bestowed upon us. I’d like to thank Harvey Milk, George Michaels, and the Academy. Because my life is almost perfect.” He brandished the empty cup. “Pour me another one, Sam.”

“I wish you had the excuse of being high.” But she poured it anyway, the machine gurgling as it oozed out bright red slush. The cold was slowly starting to recede as March overtook February, and the mechanical breeze of the air conditioning fought against the new sun. Spring was the time of romance. “Michael, this is serious. Our new informant is big time.”

The slushie was delicious. Michael sucked away at it instead of answering, pausing only nudge the straw out of his mouth and say, “Don’t worry about it, it’s not that big of a deal.”

Dana gaped at him, almost dropping the money she was counting. “Are you fucking serious? Whatever happened to your holy crusade?”

Michael shrugged loosely, waving the slushie. “Uh, I got a life. I got things to do with my time now. I mean, not that this isn’t important, but I have other things on my plate now. Appointments on my Google Calendar, if you will. I have responsibilities.”

“Responsibilities?” Dana said incredulously, dropping her money to lean over the counter and staring at him from where he stood leaning against it at the side. “I thought that discovering a popular kid conspiracy was your responsibility.”

“I picked up another righteous crusade, Dana,” Michael pled, eyes wide. Was it really so impossible to conceive that he had a life now? “It’s holy, I swear. There’s somebody I need to help.”

The other girl snorted, stepping back and punching mysterious buttons angrily into the cash register. “Of course it’s somebody. Not-boyfriend’s a boyfriend now. Call the fire brigade.”

“He’s not my boyfriend!” Michael protested, but he couldn’t help but smile. Sure, they weren’t dating, but he was more than just not a boyfriend. He was Jeremy Heere. Who Michael had had sex with multiple - mark that, multiple - times. Multiple times, emphasis on the multiple. As in more than once. Not only that, he had the cutest smile. “He’s just a guy. A perfect, perfect guy.”

Michael sighed dreamily, thinking about Jeremy’s ears. Perfect ears.

Dana gaped at him, disgusted. “Have you been eating that sushi again? I’m not going to stand here and play sassy best friend. Hell, I barely even like you. We have bigger problems.” She reached out and pulled Michael in until his elbow knocked against the front counter, scowling. “An informant, Michael? Remember those?”

“That sushi is freshly caught!” He scowled, rubbing at his elbow. Something about him must have just screamed Raggedy Ann the way they were throwing him around. “I guess we do, but can’t it wait? I’m busy tomorrow.” Jeremy had finally hacked out some time in his schedule and they wanted to break into the Colecovision collection.

Jeremy really was ridiculously busy. Between keeping up his perfect GPA, being president of both NHS and Volunteering for America, and putting in obligatory popular people hours with his million friends he was swamped. That wasn’t even counting the blow out parties every single weekend, and the time needed in the morning to sleep off the hangover. He had three different Google Calendars for each of his obligations.

Obligation was the right word for it - Jeremy made hanging out with his friends sound like court mandated community service. They absolutely couldn’t notice that he was spending less time with them than normal, but he had already been spending all of his free time with them. Extraverts were a scary beast, and Jeremy had fine tuned the machine to perfection.

Michael got it, he did. He understood why sometimes they could only get together for an hour before he had to go. It was even harder to find decent video gaming time. Jeremy was doing his best. He got it.

Yeah.

“You’re busy?” Dana said incredulously. “What, you’ve got a long night of World of Warcraft in front of you? This is a big fucking informant, Michael. This could blow the whole thing wide open. She has some serious dirt.”

“Wait, what?” Michael perked up, chasing away thoughts of Jeremy with a broom. “Do we have actual evidence?”

Dana’s face was grim. “Maybe something close. I know she’s well connected - she came to me instead of the other way around. She said to meet her at the hip teen hangout place at eight pm tomorrow night.”

Michael squinted at her. “What hip teen hangout place? Is that literally what she said?”

“It’s literally what she said.” Dana sighed, propping her elbow on the counter and her chin in her hands. “I’m pretty sure she means the mall. Macy’s, probably.”

Michael was forced to wonder how good of an informant she could possibly be if she was so vague about the meeting place. He was seriously going to rely on Dana’s intuition for this once, since in the concern of phone security Michael didn’t have the number of any of their informants. Paranoia was healthy and encouraged in the journalist business. He didn’t even have Jeremy’s number, just a weird anonymous instant messenger app that Michael had never seen before. Jeremy had alluded to Chloe regularly stealing his phone and going through it for dirt, but they had only had thirty minutes in the backseat of Michael’s car and Chloe Valentine’s own brand of investigative journalism wasn’t really on his mind.

“Fine,” Michael said, exhausted. “I just - have a lot on my mind lately. I’m prioritizing.”

“Prioritize away,” Dana said snippily as another customer came up, and she paused to ring up his beef jerky before he shambled away. “I’m sure your not boyfriend prioritizes you too.”

There was nothing to say to that, not really. Michael found himself stalking out of the convenience store instead of striding out of it, and even the slushie just tasted like ice and syrup. That wasn’t what a slushie was, man. It was more than that.

At school the next day Jeremy made a freshman practically beg apologies to him after he bumped into him. Well, Jeremy didn’t make him do it, Chloe and Rich did. Jeremy stood there and smirked. It wasn’t his fault.

After school he kicked around his house anxiously until it was time to leave for the mall, freaking out his mother. Michael hated the mall, and also people, and also outside.

“I’m meeting a friend,” Michael had insisted, knowing how inherently unbelievable that was.

She had, predictably, not been impressed. She was always really cranky if motherly duties tore her away from Grey’s Anatomy. Even if only in the figurative sense - she had still been cuddled up in a giant blanket with a wine glass. “Is it that Jeremy boy again? I don’t trust him.”

“I have more than one friend, Mom,” Michael said, exasperated. “Come on, I’ll only be out for a little while.”

“That’s what I’m worried about,” she had said mysteriously, sipping at her wine. “Don’t succumb to peer pressure, honey.”

“Your problem is that I have peers in the first place!”

She sipped her wine meaningfully, turning back to Grey’s Anatomy and leaving Michael free for whatever covert meetings in vaguely defined locations he could think of.

Actually, it wasn’t so bad. Michael fished around in his pocket as he parked his car and rode the elevator upstairs into the mall, carefully uncreasing the thick, cheery stationary. It was obviously from a stationary set, with nice quality paper and softly curling handwriting across it, and the borders had little turtles swimming along it.

It was a map of the mall, with a big red X over the female clothing department of the southern Macy’s. It was beautifully drawn and somehow comprehensible, and Michael found himself faithfully following the tracks. He had found it in his locker, obviously slipped in through the vents, which should have disturbed Michael more than it did. It was mostly incredibly thrilling, like he was a real detective. He respected this informant’s sense of drama and mystique. She really knew what was what in this situation.

He really wasn’t that big of a fan of the mall. It was big and vaguely fake marble, and endless crowds walked the beaten path around and around the food court and hallways of jewelry stores like hamsters on a wheel. The slushies from Auntie Anne’s tasted nothing like the god tier hand poured 7/11 ones, and even the ThinkGeek and the Gamestop store reeked of cheap consumerism. Being around big crowds made Michael nervous and he could never help but shake the feeling that he was supposed to be there with actual friends. People didn’t go to the mall by themselves, and they certainly didn’t go to meet mysterious contacts about a suburban conspiracy.

By the time Michael got to the women’s clothing section of Macy’s he had to settle for loitering as conspicuously as physically possible in front of the main mannequin, scanning the tops of heads for sketchy looking teenage girls. He skipped his gaze over the late night Macy’s crowd, middle aged women toting knock off bags and gently shambling old grandmothers fastidiously checking every perfume there was. A little girl stood in front of a sunglasses stand, trying on every pair there was, and Michael couldn’t help but smile at her miniature enthusiasm. Michael liked to think he was good with kids. They operated on the same wavelength most of the time, and he had even imagined that maybe he and his future husband could -

A very short girl in a hoodie, baseball cap, and jeans was lingering behind the sunglasses section, shifting the large pile of clothing in her hands as she surveyed the sunglasses carefully before picking up the biggest pair and sticking them over her nose. It was the sketchiest teenage girl he had ever seen, and Michael made a point of staring at her as long and as obviously as possible until she caught sight of him. Hopefully this was his sketchy teenager and not an everyday sketchy teenager.

The girl stuffed her hands in her hoodie pockets and nodded professionally, jerking her head to her left before turning on her heel and walking that direction. Michael hastily caught up, diving between the long racks of blouses. “Hey, I’m your contact. Hey!”

She held a finger up to her lips and kept walking. Michael followed her until they came to the dressing rooms, with a yawning woman standing in front of the little booth where they gave you the numbers. She halted in front of the women’s section, and silently handed the woman her clothing to count.

Michael was practically bouncing from foot to foot. “You’re here to talk to me, right? What, do you want me to prove my identity?”

Her giant lenses reflected Michael’s own anxious face, leaving her expression unseen. She beckoned a hand towards him, and when the woman handed her the clothing back she serenely glided into the women’s changing room.

“Hey - hey, wait, I can’t go in there!”

“He can’t go in there,” The woman said, bored.

The girl halted, and pushed her sunglasses down a little over the bridge of her nose so she could meet the two of them in a mighty and impassioned gaze. “He’s gay. And he’s with me.”

The attendant had nothing to say to that, and Michael knew better than to disagree. He toddled after her, close on her heels and feeling like a complete criminal as he stepped into the forbidden women’s changing room. It was actually wasn’t that different from a man’s changing room, which was a little disappointing. There were more benches and couches for friends to sit on in front of the changing rooms and comment on each other’s clothing, but when Michael cautiously sat on one outside the changing room that the sketchy girl had quickly slipped into he couldn’t bite down on his nervousness.

Damn, this was awesome. He had infiltrated the most holy of spaces. His contact was a mysterious figure who talked only in riddles. He had not stopped banging Jeremy Heere. Everything was coming up Michael.

Clothing rustled and zippers flew behind the door, and a single yearbook came sliding underneath the gap. Michael bent down and picked it up, ecstatic at the sheer weirdness.

He flipped through it, looking for a secret code. It had the dates for last year stamped on the cover, and an almost stock photo picture of teenagers having a nice time holding hands in front of the school. It was a pretty thick yearbook, and when he tried shaking it out no mysterious hand drawn maps fell out of it this time. He had just started trying to look for a Caesar Cipher in the page numbers when the door to the changing room opened and someone stepped outside, hands propped on her hips, staring mightily down at him.

It was Christine Canigula.

More accurately, it was Christine Canigula in a denim dress, black houndstooth leggings, a bright white scrunchie typing up her fluffy chin length hair into a little bun, and black flats. She looked pretty nice, and he would have commended her for her fashion sense if his brain hadn’t immediately filled up with a flood of question marks.

The big contact. Christine knew everybody in the school, because everybody in the school loved her. Of course!

She reached out, grabbed him by the hand, and with surprising strength pulled him into the stall with her. The minute he was inside she locked it, and she turned around and covered the exit with crossed arms and an unmistakable aura of intensity around her.

“Look at the signature pages,” she said.

Michael silently flipped to the signature pages.

Wherever she had gotten the yearbook, he had no idea. It had clearly been someone’s, someone with a healthy amount of friends but not a ridiculous amount. That someone hadn’t dog eared it, scribbled on the faces of teachers or other kids they didn’t like, stick keepsakes from girls between the pages. It was just a yearbook, and when he flipped to the signature page it was just a signature page.

Michael’s heart sank to the floor.

Have a nice summer. Have a nice summer. Have a nice summer. Have a nice summer.

“It’s all the same thing,” Michael murmured to himself, hands ghosting over the pages. Different scripts, different people, all with perfect handwriting. “Have a nice summer. There has to be two dozen signatures here just saying the same thing.”

“I stole that from the locked yearbook cabinets behind the circulation desk in the library. My ex-boyfriend’s part of the Yearbook club so I got the key from him.”

“We have a yearbook club?” Michael asked, confused. “Wait, we have a yearbook?”

Christine jabbed a finger at him, a blazing expression in her eyes. Every inch of her leaked intensity and the righteous stench of a holy crusade. Christine was in this as deep as Michael was, and he had no doubt that she had been conducting her own private investigation. “The better question is, why don’t we have a yearbook?”

“Most schools do have yearbooks,” Michael said weakly. He flipped back to the cover, squinting at the name of the school. “Middlebury High? Is that around here?”

“It’s anonymous public high school number three, remember? Ever wonder why the name’s so hard to remember?” Christine grabbed a large canvas tote bag with a friendly turtle on it from a chair in the corner, and stuffed her hoodie and disguise clothing inside. “We’re talking absolute anonymity and secrecy, Michael. I need you to trust me on this holy mission. What we’re doing is dangerous, and should not be attempted at home.”

“I’ve literally had three conversations with you,” Michael said weakly, “and those were all about play rehearsal.”

“I’m skipping play rehearsal for this,” Christine said, and Michael shut up.

Somehow his sex life and obnoxious mom didn’t feel so important.

Christine was adorable and sweet and very smart and extraordinarily ADHD. Jeremy jokingly crooned her name whenever he said it, and he had never even heard Chloe say something bitchy about her. Now they were locked in a small changing room together, standing close to each other with only a secret yearbook between them, and Michael abruptly realized the position they were in. If Jake was here he would have been punted into outer space.

Of course, if Jake had been there he would have had different problems.

Despite everything he still wanted to laugh. Locked in a changing room with a universally adored girl, getting BJs from the most popular boy in school on the side...and everything depended upon nobody ever knowing. If that just wasn’t the way.

Something heavy and stifling had begun settling over Michael’s shoulders. It was responsibility, and it tasted like gross black licorice Twizzlers.

“Here.” She grabbed the book out of Michael’s hands and held it up, opening to a random page in the front and brandishing it at him. It was in the clubs section, and showed a woodworking class’ yearly project. They had made a bench. “This is supposed to be a candid photograph.”

Michael had squinted at the two page spread, trying to figure out what he was supposed to be seeing, before the penny dropped.

There were a few pictures lined up of woodworking and metalworking sculptures. The technical skill on them was incredible, leagues beyond Michael’s own meager attempts. But there was no spirit to them, no warmth. Michael didn’t feel anything when he looked at them.

There was a photograph of two boys manning a lathe mill, grinning happily at each other. They looked precisely nice, and immaculately well put together. They were caught in the middle of working, and weren’t even looking at the camera.

The first rule of candid yearbook photos was that you always, always looked awful in them. Nobody ever looked good when some tenth grader with a hall pass whipped a camera out at you in the middle of the school carnival and started popping pictures. It was a holy rule, and nobody was immune.

Every person in the whole two page spread were caught in the middle of their work, bending over a project and talking animatedly, sawing off pieces of a block of wood. They were doing heavy, sweaty work. And they all looked perfect.

Michael flipped to another random page, this time of the track team. The team had won Nationals. There were several pictures of wiry, tall teenagers holding a golden cup, clearly fresh off the race, but they didn’t so much as look sweaty. Their hair was perfect. Their smiles were perfect. The pictures taken of them in the middle of the race, as they were running for their lives to beat the clock with a full second to spare - perfect.

“It’s a school of Jeremies,” Michael said faintly, flipping from page to page. It was the same. “Ticky tacky people.”

Christine nodded grimly, black hair not in her frizzy little bun bouncing up and down. “It’s all like that. It’s not natural. This book was hidden, shoved in the back of the locker in the room behind the circulation desk. Michael, why do we lock our yearbooks up?”

He could only shake his head, dumbfounded. He reached into his back pocket and pulled out his own pocket spiral notebook, flipping through the list of names he had collected. He flipped over to the index of the yearbook and checked each name in the book against how they appeared in the index.

“They’re all here,” Michael said distantly. “Every pod person I’ve found, they all went to this school.” He shook his head, biting in the inside of his cheek. When he looked back up at Christine she only nodded, as if he was confirming a suspicion. “This isn’t a coincidence. Something’s going on. I - I don’t know what, but something has to be happening here! People aren’t like this!” He flicked the yearbook page, where three girls holding hands were smiling up at him, of very diverse ethnicities yet identical clothing. “High school yearbooks have gross candid shots of you. They have people pulling stupid faces. All of the senior quotes are really dumb, not freaking Voltaire quotes. God, people write more on the signature pages than ‘Have a nice summer!’.”

“It’s soulless,” Christine whispered, and from the odd note in her voice Michael knew that there was nothing worse for her. “Everybody exactly the same. There’s no light or joy. I can’t even imagine what their theater productions have to look like.” She clenched her fists and grit her teeth, a weirdly severe reaction to being faced with high school plays. “I bet nobody ever forgets a line.”

On a horrible sinking feeling, Michael flipped to the index and found Aya’s name, the same soccer girl who was the friend of Precious Jones. She appeared in several spots in the yearbook - on the page for the soccer team, on the page for a haunted house production, and for her class photograph.

Sure enough, she was caught kicking a ball around without a wrinkle out of place on her soccer uniform. In the haunted house she was the picture of fright. In her class photograph…

Michael frowned, looking closer at the picture. “Is that acne?”

“Not in this school,” Christine said glumly. “No acne, no gross B.O., no sweaty gym socks.”

“No, that’s definitely acne.” Michael showed it to her, an Aya from the freshmen portion of the book. Her grin had a little bit too much teeth in it, she was looking down instead of up, and she had the unmistakable brush of acne across her forehead. “That’s not a horrible picture, but it’s not great. But if you flip back to her other pictures,” Michael pulled the pages back until you could see all three side by side, a stop motion picture of a random freshman girl with a best friend who was worried about her. “she’s a different person. Two perfect pictures, one imperfect. The acne’s gone, the teeth are whitened. It’s perfectly explainable.”

“Except for where it isn’t,” Christine said slowly. She looked up at Michael, her breath catching. “Whatever happened had happened that year! Between September when the pictures were taken and when the school year ended, something happened!”

Before Michael could even think about it, before he could talk himself out of it, he found himself flipping to a specific page in the index, trailing his finger down until he found the Hs. There were a lot of entries, but only one name in particular he was praying not to see. Only one name that he did see.

Jeremy Heere was in the yearbook a lot, as expected. There were at least seven different pages with his face on them, and Michael quickly flipped to each one. There was a student leadership conference - oh, look at his perfect hair! He looked so young. Michael couldn’t help but grin at his majestically pointing finger, the way he just stared off into the distance the way he stared best. He couldn’t help but sigh.

Then Christine gave him a strange look, and he doubled over the book again.

“How did you know Jeremy was in there?” Christine asked quietly. When Michael looked up her face was drawn and pinched, and she was looking away.

“Haven’t you heard I’m a creepy stalker?” Michael drawled. “Of course I know where he went to school.”

She didn’t say anything, her expression tight and unhappy.

Then another picture of him in the NHS, nodding studiously as a guest speaker stood in front of the class, and another picture of him throwing softballs at a teacher dunk tank. His muscles were positively rippling in that one. Nice.

Although he didn’t want to, although he knew that he wouldn’t like what he found, Michael flipped to his class photo.

“Oh my god,” Michael said, exactly as horrified as he knew he would be, “he’s a nerd!”

Christine bent in closer to look, and she sucked in a sharp gasp. “I knew it,” she whispered. “Nobody’s that perfect.”

It was, frankly, a horrible picture. Acne, eyes kept too wide for the smile to look natural, face tilted the wrong way and positively slouching. He had scraggly facial hair and unkempt hair. His smile was small and dorky and genuine, and it lit up his face.

For the first time Michael wondered if somewhere Jeremy’s best friend was sitting on a couch and crying because he had come home from school one day and wasn’t the same. The dorky, awkward Jeremy they had known had come back a stranger, beautiful and poised and perfect, and was now too good to talk to them. He wondered where that best friend was, if he still missed Jeremy. If they missed the guy who played video games nonstop and had strong opinions about the best Batman.

They probably did. Michael missed him too.

“Oh god,” Christine whispered. “Michael, I’m so sorry.”

“That’s there to be sorry about?” He had aimed for cool and flippant, the objective emotion of the hard boiled detective, but he just wanted to cry instead. He felt so betrayed. “I barely know the guy. I just thought he was hot and kind of douchey, is all. I knew he wasn’t all that great. No offence.”

Christine withdrew, clasping and unclasping her hands, and she looked as unhappy as Michael felt. How could she? How could she know what Michael was feeling? “He really likes you,” she said. She had gotten a little choked up. “He’s been so happy lately, actually happy, and he keeps on pretending it’s something else but I know why. He’s been doing that thing where he sings my name all the time and he means it. It’s really cute.” She sucked in a deep breath. “He was so sad and now he’s a little happy. And he isn’t allowed to look at you because dumb jocks think you have AIDS and I’m sorry. I’m sorry that I stood by. I didn’t know what to say.” She began gasping and scrubbing at her eyes, and Michael really, really hoped that she wouldn’t start crying because he had no idea what to do with crying girls. Christine cried a lot, even if it was happy tears. “I’m just like everybody else. All I do is stand by and watch.”

“You couldn’t do anything,” Michael said weakly. He had never known that somebody else cared too. “Awful people are going to be awful. If - if Jeremy knew that you knew he would lose it. He can’t handle people knowing. I don’t think it would help.”

“I thought that they just had really fragile male egos at first, but after a little while I got really worried.” Christine sniffled. “Jeremy and Rich get this awful horrified look in their eyes any time someone even so much as makes a joke about it. People shouldn’t have to - to live in fear all the time!”

She began crying in earnest, as Michael’s brain silently reeled. Rich? Seriously?

Oh, wait, no. That made perfect sense. Okay, never mind.

“Hey. Uh, no crying.” Michael faltered, not sure if he should put her hands on her shoulders or clasp her hand or nod professionally at her or something. She just seemed so sad. Something mysterious and disturbing had happened to their friend and a horrible attitude had been twisted into something compulsory. “I know how you’re feeling. I swear, Christine, I’ll find out what happened. Whoever taught them this crap I’ll - I’ll beat them up for you.”

Christine hiccuped a laugh, and she rubbed at her eyes as she looked up at him. She really was adorable. “I know you would.”

“Nobody makes Christine Canigula cry.” Michael smiled weakly. “Christine Canigula gets mad. And then - she smashes!”

“Like the Hulk!” She giggled, making exaggerated punching motions. “I’m punching internalized homophobia in the face!”

Before Michael could think better of it he reached over and hugged her, quick but tight, but when he tried to draw away Christine’s hands fisted around his jacket anyway and she hung on. He let the hug linger, feeling Christine’s hitched breaths smooth out into something a little calmer.

“We have no proof,” Michael said quietly.

“We will.”

“I’m not actually sure that there’s an actual explanation as to how an entire school of high schoolers became obnoxiously perfect overnight.”

“That’s what they want you to think.”

“We’ll figure it out,” Michael said. “Because Jeremy’s our friend. Right?”

Christine released him, face set in determination. Her eyes were sparking, and Michael knew that whoever had crossed Christine Canigula was in for a world of pain. Watch out, mysterious entities. Christine had come to kick ass and do play rehearsal, and she was skipping play rehearsal.

“You two are going to become prom kings or I’m burning the school down,” she whispered. “Michael and Christine partners in crime for life.”

It was kind of nice, how she just decided that. Michael wouldn’t have to spend sleepless nights in bed wondering if Christine actually liked him or not. She just told him. She just felt it. And she just kicked the ass of anyone who got in her way.

“Secret handshake?” Michael offered weakly.

Her eyes grew wide even as she carefully collected the yearbook and stuffed it back in her tote bag. Tomorrow she was going to have to put it back exactly where she found it. Not before they Xeroxed some incriminating pages, though. Who knew where it was going to mysteriously disappear to. “Secret handshake.”

By the time they figured out the ludicrously complicated secret handshake they had both calmed down, and they knew that if Michael was caught out past ten pm with a girl his parents might start to worry that he was a heterosexual or something. He drove her home, turning their conversation to lighter things, and somehow he knew that in the morning at school she would be happy to meet him. Maybe they would do their secret handshake right there in the halls, because they were the two people in the school with the least amount of fucks to give.

It would have been stupid if it was a hope, but it was a surety.

Michael had been waiting at a stoplight on his way home when his phone buzzed, which was pretty unusual. He lingered at the stop light and took a second to check it.

 **6069238454:** Party cancelled due to early police intervention. My place?

He faltered, hand slacking and letting the phone fall out of his grip.

Rich had been right, disgustingly. It was Michael’s responsibility. He had the power to ruin Jeremy’s life in a way that was so much more thorough, so damaging and complete, than Jeremy could ever do to him. Jeremy had given Michael the biggest secret of his life and he knew it better than anyone. Maybe that was why Jeremy seemed to resent him a little.

The more Michael thought about it the more he realized how that power change had creeped into every corner of their relationship - Jeremy faking it, Jeremy scrabbling for it, exerting it then falling away. He was insecure and needed to feel powerful and in control. He inherently couldn’t do that with Michael, not with the way their relationship worked. So he faked it, as if it would be good enough, and every time he tried and he failed Michael saw Jeremy grow just a little more frustrated.

And in return Michael had only promised to save his life.

 **Michael Mell:** Sure.

He closed the phone and tossed it on the car seat, taking a second to wipe his sweaty hands on his jeans before he left the intersection and pulled a U-turn.

Desperation and love wasn’t a plan, but it was a start.

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My tumblr is theinternationalacestation.tumbr.com if you have any questions, suggestions, or if you want to fight me in the pit!


	3. Chapter 3

  
  


There’s a particular disorientation in the second between sleeping and wakefulness when you don’t wake up in your own bed. The thousand strange sensations - the angle and warmth of the sunlight, the scratchy comforter, the pull and give of the mattress - pulled him into a different world, and for a few seconds all Michael knew was that wherever he was he was safe, warm, and lying next to someone who he cared about.

The soft murmur of voices permeated his world, and it was the lifeline that drew Michael back up further into wakefulness. Some paranoid instinct kept him perfectly still, keeping his breathing steady and slow and strategically rustling himself at different intervals. The distant awareness that he was hiding behind sleep, hiding from the other person in his room, began buzzing him awake. He feigned sleep and listened to Jeremy talk to himself.

“So would that make the Colecovision your great-great-great-great-grandpa?” Jeremy paused, then laughed softly to himself. “Ouch. So much for ethnic humor.” A short pause. Michael felt himself breathe. “I know he’s worth a thousand of me, even now.” The sunlight was warm on Michael’s skin, and he wanted to drift down and go back to sleep knowing that Jeremy thought that Michael was worth a thousand of him. “Come on, of course not. How could I be fond of a loser like him?”

There it was. Michael kept himself from moving. Despite the words, he felt a little fuzzy inside. Jeremy was trying to talk himself out of liking him. Score. “I promise I’m not trying to - I’m not trying to break any rules. I can do better.” It hadn’t twisted into pleading. It was reassuring, a promise. “I’ll do better, count on it. You know you can trust me.”

A period of time passed. Michael may have fallen back asleep, even as a corner of his mind clutched at the memory and refused to think of it as a dream.

In his half-awake state he thought about rules and who watched the watchmen.

When he woke up again he let himself yawn and snuggle deeper into his covers. The sound of a dresser drawer closing had woken him up, and when Michael blinked against the warm morning sun streaming in through the blinds he saw Jeremy pulling on some jeans from his drawer. The ones he was wearing last night were neatly in the hamper, Michael’s folded on the nightstand.

Michael yawned as loud as possible and stretched as obnoxiously as possible. “Five more minutes!”

“It’s six ten,” Jeremy said flatly, buckling his belt. Michael burrowed under the covers and admired the lean curve of his back, his flat stomach and abs, his cut lines. “Get up.”

“Six ten?” Michael rolled over, blinking to try and adjust his eyes to the light enough to turn his phone on. “Christ, give me another two hours. School doesn’t start until half past eight.”

“You aren’t leaving this house unless you’re somewhat presentable, which is going to take two hours. Up.”

It had probably been a mistake admitting to Jeremy that his morning routine consisted of rolling out of bed at eight, brushing his teeth and putting on clothing, then grabbing a granola bar and driving the ten minutes to school until he had gotten there precisely at 8:25, at which point he was pretty much perpetually almost late to class.

Michael sat up a little, rubbing at his eyes to stop the starbursts from flashing, and looked around Jeremy’s bedroom. He hadn’t gotten a very good look at it last night.

It was something out of a Bed Bath and Beyond catalogue. No, even neater. There were no decorations, no toys or detritus. He had a smooth white plastic desk with a plastic empty trash can underneath and a pencil organizer and desk lamp on top, with a plastic bookshelf full of textbooks next to it. There was a cork board above his desk, empty except for one slip of cardboard. He had a thin and white rug stretched over hardwood floors and under the clothes dresser Jeremy was standing in front of. A rack of dumbbells and exercise equipment was stacked in the corner, a furled up yoga mat uncurling slightly. The queen sized bed Michael was lying on was rich and soft, but the nightstand held no old books or combs, no pencils or condoms or anything but a neat charging station with their phones plugged in. The room had the slight prickly tang of Febreeze, and even as the sunlight bathed his skin with a warm glow Michael felt a little cold inside. That was all there was in the room. That, and Michael.

Jeremy bent in front of the nightstand, unhooking his phone from the charger, and Michael reached out a hand and grabbed Jeremy’s wrist. “Hey, we got time. Stay a little.”

“I have to work out and take a shower,” Jeremy said thinly. He didn’t tug himself out of Michael’s grip, and Michael rubbed his thumb in smooth motions over his slight wrist. His spine was stiff like iron but he didn’t break away from Michael’s eyes. “I should go.”

There was a lot to say to that, but Jeremy would have been preparing himself for all of it. He probably had a thousand reasons and excuses. So instead Michael propped himself up a little more and reached out with his other hand to ruffle Jeremy’s hair.

It was coarse but soft and thick and messy, less and more than perfect, and he watched Jeremy’s jaw drop in mortification. He squeaked and battled Michael’s hand away. “Michael!”

Michael laughed and, on impulse, grabbed Jeremy’s shoulder so he fell on the bed. Jeremy bounced resoundly, falling all over Michael’s legs in a pretty undignified position, and they both laughed as Michael leaned in to kiss him again.

They separated, still laughing a little, and Michael lightly pushed Jeremy as he pushed him back, and they fell on each other mutually trying to push each other off the bed.

“Stop pulling my hair!”

“I will when you let go of my arm - ow, that’s cheating!”

Jeremy grinned, and leaned over the bed to grab a pair of sweatpants sitting on the nightstand for him and gave it to Michael to put on. “I play king of the hill for keeps.”

“Damn, don’t have to tell me twice.” Michael grinned and leaned in, but he only kissed Jeremy on the forehead this time. He scrunched up his nose. It was adorable. “You never cuddle with me. Come on, let’s just hang out a little. Working out, protein shakes, and school can wait. I brought my 4DS.”

Stay, Michael was asking, and when Jeremy’s eye twitched he knew that he wouldn’t.

“Why would I do that?” Jeremy pushed himself upwards, sliding off the bed without looking back at Michael. He started digging through his dresser for a shirt, pulling out a stylish gunmetal gray shirt with a distressed Elvis picture on the front. “You’re getting clingy.”

Ah, there it was. Michael pushed himself so he was sitting upright, tugging on the pants. “I can hardly get any less clingy, dude. So far as the world knows I haven’t said a word to you in weeks.”

“Why would you?” He set the shirt aside as he pulled out workout gear, including a shirt that Michael could have sworn was Rich’s. Ew. “Don’t congratulate yourself.”

Guy was fucking schizophrenic. “If you want me to jump out the window and sneak away into the bushes just ask.” He should get up from the bed, but it was literally six am and he was dead tired. They hadn’t exactly gone to bed early last night. He had no idea how Jeremy did it. “You can’t just booty call me and then pretend like you’re the one who did me a favor.”

“You’re a lot hotter when you aren’t talking.”

They got ready for the day in silence.

Even though the simmering anger Michael felt no shame about watching Jeremy work out, especially since he could tell that Jeremy was growing steadily more annoyed with him. He made up for being a dick with those pecs. Mmm.

He got dressed himself as Jeremy showered, spitefully leaving everything rumply and tangled, before looking around the room and feeling the familiar awkwardness when you were sitting alone in someone else’s bedroom that you weren’t really familiar with.

Wait. Jeremy was in the shower. He could snoop!

No, that wouldn’t be right. Michael grabbed his shoes from the corner of Jeremy’s closet that they had both hastily shoved their shoes into. The sight of those two pairs of shoes happily resting next to each other being wrested apart was oddly tragic. Michael gave his pair a little shake, as if it was waving goodbye. No, Jeremy’s shoes cried, take me with you!

Well, he was embarrassing. He was so caught up in listening for the sound of Jeremy’s shower running he accidentally jammed his wrist against a cardboard box hidden in the back, and all convictions not to snoop went promptly out the window.

It was probably something completely benign. It wasn’t actually compromising his moral principles if the startlingly large amount of cardboard boxes in Jeremy’s closet were just as boring as the rest of his room, i.e. extremely. There was nothing unethical about looking in boring cardboard boxes that probably held his tax returns or something.

Michael’s hand crept closer to it, squatting on his heels and half-rising only to count the number of boxes on his top shelf. They lined up against the back wall of the closet, and across the top shelf. There had to be at least six, and that was if he didn’t have more stashed deeper inside. For someone with absolutely nothing in his room he sure had a lot packed away.

As quietly as he could, Michael grabbed one of the boxes and lightly hovered it out of the closet just far enough that pressed slacks weren’t draping across the top. He would have felt more guilty about it if Jeremy wasn’t such a dick half the time and also if he weren’t on a righteous crusade for justice, which just so happened to include today going through his FWB’s things. You either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become a villain.

The box was yellowing slightly, crumpled at the corners from where it had been roughly shoved into the back. It smelled like dust and Febreeze, and Michael pinched the bridge of his nose to keep from sneezing as he kicked up a cloud of dust. Nobody had looked at this thing in a long time. Definitely tax returns.One edge of it was particularly worn and the lid was bent a little out of shape, and Michael gently worked it upwards so it wouldn’t creak against the bent top.

The box had a collection of old Jack Kirby New Gods comic books. Not expensive but a really good run, with fun ideas and a creative team that would go on to do great things. Old, nerdy Jeremy had good taste. A loose picture was thrown over the top of the books, shifting a little as the lid moved, and Michael picked it up.

It was a woman, someone who he instantly understood as Jeremy’s mother, and she was standing in front of the Met clasping the hand of a particularly dweeby -

Someone grabbed Michael’s wrist and pried the picture out of his hand. When Michael looked up Jeremy’s face was cold - not angry or hurt, but cold. He jammed the picture back into the box, threw the lid on, and kicked it back into the closet and rounded on Michael.

He bounced up, feeling immensely guilty but not as guilty as he probably should have been. He was on a mission and sometimes you had to do questionably creepy things for the sake of that mission. Maybe more than sometimes. Historically the mission had needed a lot of questionably creepy things done, but it was for a good cause. Probably.  

It was also hard not to notice that Jeremy was dripping wet and only had a towel on. He forced himself only to look at his face, which was marred by disgust. It made it a little difficult to look at.

“Uh, it wasn’t what it looks like?”

Jeremy curled his lip and Michael automatically flinched. Busted. “It looks an awful lot like you were going through my shit.”

“I dropped a sock?”

“Christ.” Jeremy pinched the bridge of his nose, the picture of somebody who had far better things to do with his time than deal with Michael. To be fair, his mother often held that look too. “I just had to fuck the creepy stalker.”

“Ouch,” Michael said weakly. “Straight for the heart.”

Saying that made it look like it hadn’t actually, in fact, gone straight for the heart. Humor was the best defense mechanism. It was better than Jeremy’s defense mechanisms, which mostly consisted weird power plays and generally being terrible.

“If you’re looking for blackmail you already have it.” His hair was lank and flat across his face, still dripping rivulets of water, emphasizing how much blackmail Michael had. “And if you want creepy jerk off material you’re better off going through my underwear drawer.”

Michael’s heart shriveled up a little, but deep in his chest Michael couldn’t have felt angry even if he tried. When he knew why Jeremy was saying all this shit it just became a little pathetic.

Big, bad Jeremy Heere, dripping wet in a towel, desperately trying to lie to himself. Michael wondered, not for the first time, who taught him to hate himself.

“Was that your mom?”

Jeremy flinched, gritting his teeth and looking away. “No shit.”

“You never talk about her,” Michael said gently.

“Why would I?” Jeremy dropped the towel and Michael gaped as he casually scrubbed his hair with it, moving towards his dresser and pulling his clothing back on. This time when he yanked the jeans on it was almost aggressive, wrinkling them a little. “She cheated on my useless father and divorced him. It was his own fault for not getting a fucking job.” He yanked the shirt back on, and the disgust in his face had begun to find a different target. Michael wasn’t sure if it was his parents or himself. “If you’re worried about him seeing you don’t be. He doesn’t wake up until ten. He has a long day of sitting on the couch doing nothing to get to.”

“You have to do a lot around here, huh?” Michael asked quietly.

Jeremy almost slammed the dresser door shut. “Does the cooking, the cleaning, the bills, and my own life sound like a lot to you? God, I don’t know how I even make time for you.” He pulled his shirt over his head, running his fingers through his hair again and again until he exhaled a deep breath. “Brush your teeth, I can smell it from here.”

Michael went, wondering how he could feel pity and hurt and resentment and a deeper acceptance and acknowledgement all at once.

There was an unopened pack of toothbrushes in the drawer, and thought that maybe that had something to do with it.

Michael had just bent over to spit into the sterile sink when he heard rustling in the room and saw something out of the corner of his eye. Leaving the water running, he poked his head out to see Jeremy standing in front of the door mirror.

He was staring at it with equal intensity Christine had displayed last night, the entirety of his fearsome concentration applied solely to his reflection. He tugged at his jeans, he smoothed out any wrinkles in the faux-casual t-shirt, he aligned his stitches and cleaned the sleep out of his eye and fixed his hair three different times five different ways, never good enough. His head would twitch to and fro sometimes, listening for the sound of his own imperfections, and then he would dive straight back into cleaning and aligning and practicing his smile.  

It was like watching an actress put her face on, or Michelangelo paint the Sistine Chapel. It was the creation of the image. Perfect was being assembled right before Michael’s eyes in the most breathtaking display of vanity he had ever seen.

Michael’s toothbrush was still sticking out of his mouth, and even as Jeremy’s back was turned he started a little and turned around, eyes widening as he saw Michael. It may have been wishful thinking, but he looked a little ashamed.

Then he smiled and spread his hands, displaying himself on the runway. “What do you say, am I hot or what?”

Michael stared at him, looked him up and down, and chewed a little on the toothbrush in his mouth.

He finally popped it out and said, “I liked you better naked.”

He ducked back inside the bathroom just in time to hear Jeremy’s shocked laugh, high pitched and a little reedy, and he couldn’t bite back his own smile.

There was no question of Michael driving Jeremy to school. It was strongly implied that Michael should leave as quickly as possible and not hang around playing on his phone on Jeremy’s bed, which apparently desperately needed to be made up with military corners. Michael heckled him about it until Jeremy finally threw a pillow at him to make him shut up, and he messed up his clothing as much as physically possible just to make his eye twitch. He was practically muttering under his breath with righteous indignation.

It was too early to go to school but Jeremy was already pulling on his shoes and doing one final check over himself in the mirror. Michael lingered in front of the desk and looked at the cork board and the single personal item in the entire room stuck firmly to it with a pin.

Michael snorted under his breath. Wish You Were Heere. It was still funny.

He slipped down the stairs, waving goodbye even as he knew that Jeremy would close the door in his face.

Jeremy Heere was literally satan, with a dark and mysterious past and a closet full of insecurities and defense mechanisms, including severe internalized homophobia and probably body image problems. He was Princess Peach and Bowser, and he talked to himself when he thought Michael was asleep so he could try not to care about him. Michael knew this and for whatever ridiculous goddamn reason he still liked him. Like-liked him. Also they were having sex.

Michael grinned as he opened the door to a bright and shining new day. He totally dug him.

  
  


**Michael Mell:** hey look what I found

 **Michael Mell:** [foot.jpg]

 **6069238454:** This number is for emergencies.

 **Michael Mell:** its an emergency!!

 **6069238454:** That’s your foot, Michael.

 **Michael Mell** : its an emergency how BORED I am in math

 **Michael Mell:** seriously im pretty sure that this class is how I die

 **Michael Mell:** F

 **Michael Mell** : wait do you even know memes. Omg you DON’T

 **Michael Mell** : does this mean that you don’t get any of my jokes??

 **Michael Mell:** jeremyyyy

 **Michael Mell:** [backofjeremyshead.jpg]

That did it. Jeremy actually turned around in his seat and glared bloody murder at Michael, who gave him a toothy grin and a thumbs up in victory. If whatever weird genetic enhancements that had made him a popular douchebag had given him the ability to shoot laser beams Michael would be totally dead right now.

He saw Jeremy bend angrily over his lap where he was hiding his phone. Brooke, from where she was sitting next to him, didn’t bother to try and hide how she was texting.

 **6069238454:** Stop being such a creep.

 **Michael Mell:** haters gonna hate

 **6069238454:** Apparently Michael Mells have to be annoying because you literally never stop.

 **Michael Mell:** maybe I’d be less annoying if I got more than five hours of sleep last night

 **Michael Mell:** this has been a call out post

He didn’t respond, looking up from his lap to take more notes as Michael bent over his paper and did the same. He had given up the conversation for over when the light began blinking on his phone again.

 **6069238454:** I’m sorry for the stuff I said this morning. I don’t really have an excuse.

Michael smiled.

 **Michael Mell:** nope not at all thanks for realizing

 **Michael Mell:** but I was going through your stuff so I’m sorry about that too. Tbh I’m just one of those people who sees a button and presses it I didn’t think.

 **6069238454:** Yeah well everything I said was uncalled for

 **6069238454:** Except for the parts where I called you a creepy stalker because that is absolutely true and you really should work on that.

Michael rolled his eyes, wishing he could disagree. He should get a press pass. He hid the phone for a little bit as he worked, agonizing over what to say. He also took a screenshot of the apology, just for good measure, before realizing that it was against their dumb confidentiality clause and that he had to delete it.

That was okay. He had a better picture.

 **Michael Mell** : new rule for every mean thing you say to me you have to say three (3) nice things

 **6069238454:** That’s so dumb

 **Michael Mell:** wow guess who has to say three (3) nice things to me now

There it was. Jeremy turned around and glared at him again, but he looked a little like he was cracking up too. Brooke looked at him, knocking her foot against his, and he leaned over and whispered in her ear, making her blush. Michael rolled his eyes. So easily susceptible to Jeremy’s charms. Thank goodness Michael was immune to them.

Ten agonizing minutes ticked by, and Michael tried not to think about the fact that Jeremy was so allergic to saying nice things about him. Look, it’s math. Oh, man, so exciting. What great math they were being given today.

 **6069238454:** you’re super hot

Michael shook his head.

 **Michael Mell:** try harder

He waited for a little more, still pretending to think about math. Math was thrown at him and he passively accepted it into his life.

 **6069238454:** you put up with me even though I’m a jerk?

 **6069238454:** and you restore and sell old pinball machines to fund your video game collection and that’s honestly so iconic??

 **6069238454:** nice eyes??? Am I doing this right?

 **Michael Mell:** :D :D :D

 **Michael Mell:** so like did it hurt or what

 **6069238454:** not as much as I thought it would

 **Michael Mell:** dont worry i have other sources of self esteem now

 **Michael Mell:** check it out

He sent the selfie. It was of him and Christine with their arms slung around each other, grinning and doing the ‘V for Victory’ sign in front of the sign up sheet for technical work in the school play. Michael’s looping signature was clearly visible at the bottom.

 **6069238454:** WHAT THE FUCK

 **6069238454:** SINCE WHEN DO YOU HANG OUT WITH CHRISTINE WHY ARE YOU IN THE PLAY YOU DON’T TALK TO CHRISTINE WHAT THE WHY DO YOU LOOK LIKE BEST FRIENDS

 **6069238454:** MICHAEL!!!

Heh.

It was both the perfect cover and an insidious plan for Christine to rope in more help for the school play. She was already in an advantageous position in the school, what with being universally adored. Christine had friends from all walks of life, and although Michael was a little bit of a stretch it wasn’t so unimaginable that they couldn’t sell suddenly being friends. They had spent an entire passing period trying to think of cool backstories as to how they met, anywhere from accidentally grabbing the same slushie at the 7/11 to Michael tackling a guy trying to steal her purse. Eventually they settled on Michael discovering a deep and abiding love of musical theater and Christine taking him under her wing to show him the ropes. This was exceptionally easy to sell, considering the fact that as a gay guy everyone basically just assumed that he liked musicals. It also didn’t help that he did, in fact, enjoy musicals.

There was nothing to complain about. It was perfectly believable. Jeremy had absolutely no grounds for complaint and he could take that straight to court.

She had still liked him in the morning, when the quiet danger of a late night shopping mall and the thump of dressing room locks faded away. When Michael had walked in the door that morning she had perked up and waved to him. She had ran over, grabbed his hand, and dragged him over to where she was standing with her tolerant cast members. They were weirdos, but not that bad. They didn’t look at Michael funny or like he was scum at the bottom of his shoe. They had just seen that Christine adopted yet another rando, shrugged, and asked him about his opinions on The Phantom of the Opera. Michael had a lot of opinions about the Phantom of the Opera and it was nice to say so.

They even pulled off the secret handshake again. It was a miracle that either of them even remembered it, but they knew what was important. Secret handshakes. Secret handshakes were important.

They broke for lunch, and Michael was just about to send Jeremy another creepy picture of the back of his head when he saw Rich roll up and give him a friendly punch on the arm. Jeremy laughed, ducking his head and ineffectually shoving Rich back as he exchanged high fives with Jake. Michael lowered his phone and dove into the wilds of the hallway, anxiously looking around his locker area for any more jocks with relationship issues. Rich’s social power slash social insanity had proven disturbingly effectual in making them back off, but once your home was broken into once it never truly felt safe again. He should call his insurance company.

When Michael saw two thick packets of paper stacked neatly in his locker he thought inanely that his credit score wouldn’t be nearly good enough. For once Michael would like to be the one who was always freaking everyone else out.

He carefully pulled a corner of the thick stack of papers out and saw a familiar spread of black and white photographs, just long enough to know what the pictures were. He held his backpack up to the bottom of the locker and swept them inside the laptop pocket with one smooth motion, shaking his bag to settle them to the bottom and closing his locker door like nothing had ever happened.

“Michael?”

“Nothing’s happening!” Michael shouted, jumping almost a foot in the air. Smooth, Mell.

It was Wilson, in baggy jeans and with both hands stuffed in his hoodie pocket. He smiled weakly at Michael, shifting from foot to foot, and Michael grinned widely and probably insanely from where he had pressed up against his locker, shielding its empty contents from the invisible enemy.

“Okay,” he said, drawing the word out. “Hey, you wanna be my partner in the Smash tournament today?”

Michael blinked, thrown off balance. “Smash tournament?”

“Uh, the same one we have every week?” Wilson looked away, burrowing deeper into his hoodie. “It’s cool if you’re busy, though.”

Of course he wasn’t busy. Wilson actually asking them to partner together was great, especially when he usually partnered with Drake. They seemed to be fighting lately, Drake growing surlier and more unsure by the day, but Michael wasn’t really keeping his finger on that pulse. A Smash tournament was the football tailgate party of nerds, he wouldn’t have missed it for the world.

Which was what he would have liked to say. Michael was forced to smile weakly and rub the back of his head. “Ah, I got play rehearsal right now. I promised Christine and all. Maybe next time?”

“Yeah,” Wilson mumbled, face bright red. “Christine. You’re friends now, I guess.”

“Uh, yeah?” Michael shrugged, hefting his backpack up on his shoulder. “Christine’s awesome. We met when we accidentally ran to each other in the musical theater aisle of Target. We have a shared passion.”

“Whatever,” Wilson said, looking away and waving goodbye. “Maybe next time, right?”

Okay, that was weird.

Michael was embarrassed to say that he had genuinely thought that they were going to play rehearsal. He had honestly been a little excited about it - after all the hype it had to have some sort of latent value to the community and the self, right? The behind the stage lives of the theater kids were a mysterious and obscured world, and anything could happen within their depths.

He didn’t even make it to the classroom. He saw Christine first, swinging her big turtle tote bag and chatting merrily with Theater Nerd #26, a girl with an undercut dyed bright blue and a leather jacket.

When Christine saw him she waved, and Michael waved weakly back. The nerd did a double take but ended up just shrugging, and when Michael approached she easily looped her arm around his without a break in the chatter.

“So Michael and I thought we saw a pregnant dog out near the running track, but we couldn’t be quite sure become sometimes baby deer look a little like pregnant dogs, but only the really fat ones, so we wanted to go take another look, because even though it would be really cute for a mommy dog to adopt a baby deer I’m not so sure about the long term efficacy of that plan and it’s become really important to me really quickly that this mystery is solved so I’m probably going to have to skip play rehearsal again, is that okay? Great! Let the others know for me.” Christine beamed at the nerd, who looked faintly dizzy, and began tugging Michael away from the crowds. “I love you! Goodbye, my child!”

She was a tornado, for sure. It was usually easier to just do whatever you want and obfuscate your purpose than ask permission, and although Christine seemed to like going for the simple lie Michael knew that before long the lies were going to begin piling up. It had been simpler when it was just him, but now that someone with an actual life was involved they were going to have to begin dodging people. Even Michael had begun doing so.

How far were they going to have to take this?

“I made a new friend I think you’d like!” Christine chirped, and she squeezed at his arm. “I think he’s a little shy, though.”

Michael bit down hard on the inside of his cheek. God, she really was serious about this. He had no idea how she kept on getting this information, other than through just knowing everybody in the school. That might explain it. Still, it was wildly impressive.

“You’re pretty good at making friends,” Michael said weakly as he pretended Christine wasn’t shepherding him to an unknown dead drop location. “I’m beginning to feel kind of unnecessary.”

She looked up at him, frowning slightly. “Are you kidding? You’re the one who inspired me to do this, Michael. You’re the one who opened my eyes. All of this, what we’ve been working towards - it’s all you.”

He didn’t have any more time to process that statement before she pulled him into a stairwell, beelining for a shadowy corner underneath the large, winding steps. It was a relatively secluded area, with the stairs leading up to the roof exit and random bookshelves and broken chairs stuffed underneath the large area beneath the stairs. Michael recognized it immediately - it was the popular stairwell makeout spot for the straights. He immediately felt his face grow bright red as he and Christine tucked themselves into the farthest corner.

“You’re always putting me in the most awkward positions.”

“I’m tiny, I can fit into stairwells.” She proceeded to hop onto a broken chair with one of those swivel desk arms, tucking her feet underneath her and rubbing her eyes. “You got my present?”

Michael nodded, patting his backpack. There had been a furious internal debate about the security risks of taking it with him or leaving it in his locker, but if it had been so easy for Christine to break into it it might be easy for other parties too. “This has to be half the book, Christine. How late you were up photocopying it?”

“Oh, I watched Phantom of the Opera on my phone while I was doing it, it was fine.” She betrayed herself by yawning, and in the dim light of the corner he could just barely make out deep bags under her eyes. “You look tired too. Were you making plans for our pursuit of justice?”

Michael tried not to look sketchy and failed. “You could say that.” It wouldn’t be true, but you could say it. He sighed, stuffing his hands in his bright red vinyl pockets. He had no idea how his life had come to this - hiding in a gross stairwell with condoms on the floor with one of the more popular girls in school seriously discussing their conspiracy theories about the most popular guy in school, who Michael was having sex with and who seemed to hate him on alternate hours. “Christine, I don’t know how we’re supposed to work together if I have to avoid all of your friends to do it and pretend that we just met each other.” Well, they had only just met each other, but there was a fire forged bond there and he wasn’t going to ruin that. “I’m glad that you’re not ashamed to be seen with me in public, which is a pretty fucking low bar, but if we suddenly start skipping play rehearsal to run off together Jeremy’s going to notice.”

Whatever Christine would have had to say to that was lost, because they heard the shuffle of feet on the stairs. They shut up abruptly, Christine hopping off the desk retreating a little further into the darkness as Michael was forced to almost press up against her, and waited for the sound of the stairwell door to open so whatever happy teenager could prance along on their way and leave the co-conspirators in peace. None came, and the person was lingering.

The stairwell was thick with darkness, and when Michael breathed in it was musty and slightly sour. The warm press of Christine’s chest against his was a little uncomfortable, but a little nice, as if they were hugging. He felt her breaths rise and fall. It should have been warm in the muggy, un-airconditioned pit, but the goosebumps along the sides of his arms chilled him.

“Hello? Hello, is anyone there? Are - oh shit, sorry!”

A lanky boy with the curliest brown jewfro he had ever seen poked his head in before yelping and covering his eyes. Christine and Michael shot a glance at each other, rolling their eyes.

“Ah, I’m sorry, I’m meeting someone - I’ll just go now!”

Michael didn’t know if he should be pleased that their contact showed or rolling his eyes that he was so indiscreet. He and Christine stepped away from each other, so much as they could, and Christine stretched out to grab his arm and pull him inside.

It must have been hideously confusing for the guy, because he yelped and stumbled as Christine pulled him into the pits of the stairwell. The dark heavily tinted the strange scene, obscuring the guy’s more precise features, but it was hard to mistake the horror and confusion on his face.

Michael silently pulled out his tape recorder and spiral notebook as Christine crossed her arms. He had the distinct impression she would have been wearing sunglasses if it wasn’t so dark already. “Are you Tyler Taylor?”

“Last time I checked, yeah.” He gaped around the stairwell, then at the both of them. “Are you two my...holy shit! Christine Canigula?”

They shushed him in tandem, and he sheepishly crowded further into the stairwell with them. So much as it had not been exactly designed for two yet was willing to accommodate the idea it it had definitely not been progressive enough for polyamorous relationships

“My codename is LaBlanche,” Christine whispered.

Michael rolled his eyes, even though he knew that neither of them could see it. “It’s highly unlikely you actually know my name, so just try Thing 2. She’s Thing 1.”

He had definitely expected Tyler roll his eyes along with him at Christine’s antics, but instead he gasped in excited horror. “This is really serious! What’s going on?”

“We have the structure of a terrorist organization,” Christine whispered, “so I can’t tell you too many details in case you get captured.” That was unfortunate - Michael had told Precious quite a bit, but maybe the new information they had raised the stakes. It certainly felt like it. “Just tell us what you have and we’ll see what we can do.”

Tyler nodded firmly. “Right.” He sucked in a deep breath, then stopped. He looked away, rubbing at his nose. He opened his mouth to say something, then closed it. He was choked up.

Everybody always went on about how teenagers didn’t care about each other, how willing they were to stab each other in the back or make and lose friendships at the drop of a hat. But it seemed to Michael that sometimes they forgot how much teenagers could love each other too. Friends, boyfriends or girlfriends, even teachers and parents. Michael was never ashamed to feel love. He and Christine got along because they both had mad and frantic feelings about most everything.

That was what kept them going throughout this strange little conspiracy, what fueled Christine’s surprisingly complex contact network and Michael’s relentless battery against Jeremy’s defenses. Michael and Christine cared. A lot. About everything.

But especially their friends.

“I had a really good friend freshman year,” Tyler said finally, having done the best he could at collecting himself.His voice was still hoarse. “He was really, really smart, and loved reading philosophy and going on and on about his favorite philosophers. He read, like, everything. He was really goofy and energetic. He was a total and complete loser but I was a loser too, so things were okay.” He paused for a long second, and the hair on the back of Michael’s neckbegan to rise. “I...I knew that there was something wrong with him. He...was in the hospital for a little while, because he tried to...yeah. I stayed with him.” He smiled weakly. “Best friends forever or something. At the time we thought that it was only friends forever. After a little while I started thinking about being more than friends.”

He stopped, lost in the last vestiges of a regret, and Michael silently scrawled as much down in his notebook as he could as Christine stayed silent. He was going to have to put these files onto a USB drive and delete the app before downloading it again. This was bigger than the others. At first the paranoia had been for fun, but when it became for real it quickly wore on you like a fifty pound weight, or like a metal sculpture of a tumbleweed churning in your gut.

Tyler took a deep breath. Michael knew that he had never admitted this before.

“Then Rich changed.”

Almost in unison Michael and Christine slapped their hands over their mouths to stop the scream. Rich? Out of everyone in the school, out of everyone in the world, Rich?

It had to be a mistake. No way. He looked down at Christine, who looked even more confused and horrified than he did. Rich was a psycho. He wasn’t perfect or poised or put together. He wore those deeply creepy tie dyed shirts and did that weird thing with his legs that always made Michael deeply uncomfortable. He wasn’t like the rest of them. There was no way.

Tyler had been expecting their reaction. He nodded grimly, eyes drawn and tight. “You don’t believe me. I couldn’t tell anybody, nobody would ever believe me. He didn’t transfer here sophomore year, Thing 1 and Thing 2. He was always here. Fourth day sophomore year he comes to school and he’s horrible. At first I thought it was the new medication he was on. Then I thought the depression had finally gotten to him, or that he had something else undiagnosed.” He bit his hand, rocking back and forth anxiously. “Mental illness doesn’t make you jacked. It doesn’t put you on the football team or make you the terror of the school. I had been so sure of that the first few months, but as time went by I think I made myself forget. After a while I just accepted that the sweet, smart guy I used to like had a psychotic break and was now a popular, football playing asshole. And that he hated me.”

Then he shut up, clearly wrung out with nothing but a one minute monologue to detail the greatest regret of the last three years, left with only Thing 1 and Thing 2 to bear silent witness to the heartbreak.

Somehow the strangest part of it was that someone out there had genuinely liked Rich for who he was as a person and now missed him. For everything Rich had gained he never got that back.

“He and Jeremy are so close,” Christine whispered. “They just work on the same wavelength. It’s actually super weird. Tyler, if that’s true, then this goes back further than we thought. It’s wider than we thought. Thing 2, it’s in our school!”

It was in their school.

It was among them.

It was watching.

“Hold on,” Tyler said, confused. “I was talking about Rich. What’s it? Did someone do this to him?”

Christine and Michael looked at each other.

“That is,” Michael said faintly, “a very good question.”

“I don’t know if I want the answer,” Christine whispered.

It could be a substitute teacher with an evil brain slug, moving from school to school working dark magic as she went. It could be the janitor, slipping hallucinogens into the floor wax. It could be the plumber, putting poison into the water mains.

A roving, unseen phenomena - or a real person? Which was scarier?

“If it’s a person we can fight it,” Michael whispered to himself. He rounded on Christine, and felt the courage bubble in his chest. He grabbed her shoulders, trying to give her it too. “If it’s someone doing this to them than we can fight it! Expose them, save Jeremy and Rich, become heroes - stop this from ever happening again! We can do it, I know we can!”

“Yeah,” Christine said weakly, “the only problem is that we don’t know what it is.”

There was nothing to say to that. They didn’t. What was going on was so weird that natural causes could hardly be attributed. It was so explainable and semi-ordinary that it was impossible to gain any real proof to say that it was anything other than natural causes.

It was the scale of the thing that got them. A complete change in a day? Friends flipped into worst enemies - which, granted, wasn’t that unusual in teenagers? An entire school? Michael had to believe that these questions had meaningful answers.

“We can’t give up,” Michael hissed. He turned to Tyler, the courage in him bubbling and spitting and raising him above a dark stairwell with condoms on the floor in a suburban public high school. “Any of us. Don’t forget who he was, Tyler. You’re the only one who remembers who he used to be, and if you forget it’s like he was never there in the first place. He’ll become like...like someone important to us. Who that person used to be is dead, and there’s nobody left to mourn him.” He quieted, the courage twisting into something different. “That person lives in boxes now. Sometimes you’ll see him in a flash of light, playing video games or holding you close to him, but he’s scared of that ghost too. He’ll push you away. Tyler, who Rich used to be might be gone forever. It’s been a long time.”

It was dark, and even as it isolated them it seemed to break down the boundaries of distance between their own bodies. A bubbling and heady emotion rose in all of them at once, and Michael could practically taste it in the air.

“You can stop loving somebody,” Tyler said, “but you can’t forget.”

Something deep in Michael’s chest ached, but it was almost reassuring. No matter how this whole thing turned out, if Michael was unsuccessful and Jeremy never found his happiness again, Michael would never forget.

A small cacophony of feet descended the stairs.

The three teenagers froze, and Michael pulled all three of them as deep in the stairwell as they could go. But it was still three people, and there was no way that they would all be able to hide.

Still, the chances were overwhelming it was just a random person. The paranoia really was getting to them. Michael met Christine’s eyes the best he could in the dark, and they smiled reassuringly to each other. Tyler had screwed his eyes shut, breathing deeply. He had been having a pretty stressful lunch. It would be okay. Things would be okay in the end. They gave each other that.

“Okay, okay, let me try this one. Is there an...H?”

Fuck, it was Jeremy.

What were the fucking chances!

The acoustics in the stairwell carried Jeremy’s voice, making it echo. After a few seconds he heard far more voices accompany him, heels clicking against cement and heavy thumps echo down the stairwells.

“Ey, fuckhead, slow down with your giant chicken legs.”

Without another word Christine and Michael looked at each other, looked at a terrified Tyler, and began picking up the abandoned small bookshelves and shoving them in a corner, leaving only a small space between them. Tyler, quickly picking up on what they were doing, began helping them too.

“What about an S? You’re such a cheater.”

Jeremy’s voice was quieter than the others, and Michael just knew that he was talking to himself again. He only heard him through the stairwell acoustics.

“And then I said, there is no way you’re showing up at my house with that bag. I’m allergic to corduroy.”

“I thought you were allergic to lactose?”

“A woman can be allergic to two things, Brooke.”

“Maybe I can get one of those little magnetic Chutes and Ladder travel things. Wait, is that too nerdy? Yeah?”

The team hidden underneath the stairwell worked faster. They were going to be noticed. If Rich saw Tyler here talking with them the whole gig was blown wide open. Probably.

“And then I was just like, sorry, man, I’m straight edge. My parents would kill me if they found pot in the house.”

“J-man, your parents hid cocaine in the house.”

“Yeah, but that wasn’t, like, pot. I saw that PSA. Shit can kill.”

“J-man, your parents jumped out the window with a suitcase when the IRA showed up.”

“Tax fraud doesn’t kill you!”

“J-man,” Rich said, “dude.”

From next to him Michael could barely see Tyler roll his eyes. “That’s his ‘talking to stupid people’ voice. It’s him, alright.”

“They’re best friends,” Michael whispered back to him, trying frantically to push the chairs into a line that obscured the back of the stairwell as the voices descended.

“Chloe, your makeup is so flawless today. It, like, totally accents your eyes? Which are just so brown today.”

“They’re brown everyday. But your hair is so blonde today, I saw it shining in the sun and I almost cried. Did you, like, condition it?”

“Aw, Chloe!”

“Aw, Brooke!”

Michael couldn’t believe that they were all like this in reality. They were...morons.

Far quieter, he heard Jeremy say, “But Monopoly’s so boring! Look, I really don’t think video games are going to - it’s okay, I like Monopoly! It’s always fun hanging out with you!” Chloe’s voice rose and overtook his before quieting. “I know. Life’s been kind of exciting lately, hasn’t it?”

“Jeremy, if we’re going to find Christine we have to stop mumbling!” Chloe pitched her voice louder. “Christine! Yolanda saw you come in here! They need you at play rehearsal!”

They gave Tyler a leg up as he dove into the secluded corner. In the dark he was almost invisible.

“What about you guys?” He whispered. There was no way they could hide now.

“You’re screwed if we get caught,” Christine whispered. “I got an A in our improv unit, we’ll be fine. Places, everyone!”

Turns out it hadn’t been so much of a coincidence that they found them after all.

“Christine, are you down here?” Chloe called. “I need you to help me with my makeup!”

They had to draw attention from Tyler. They had to explain why they were in an abandoned makeout stairwell together. They obviously weren’t making out, so they had to think of another reason why Michael and Christine were whispering in the corner. There was no way Jeremy wasn’t going to think that he was spilling the beans on them. He’d never trust Michael again.

Christine, with her ADHD mind that worked at a frantic and frenzied pace that made her the god of improv, reached up and grabbed him by the shirt collar. She stepped them out into full view beyond the stairwell and Michael knew that for the first time in his goddamn life that these morons whose lives he didn’t care about, these morons who meant that he couldn’t kiss the man he cared about in public, could see him in full view for the first time.

“I am so sorry about this,” Christine whispered.

She mashed their lips together in a deep and passionate kiss.

In that second Michael remembered quite thoroughly that he didn’t like women and he understood even more thoroughly that Christine didn’t entirely like guys. That was a revelation he could save for later. In the moment Christine was kissing him, lips hot against his, her body pressed up against his, and Michael found himself stretching his arms to hug her as they went further into it.

Jeremy shrieked.

They broke apart, not having to pretend to be embarrassed. Michael knew he was beet red. His lip tasted like cherry chapstick and the sweat of Christine’s righteous justice. He made sure to ruffle Christine’s hair and put it in disarray before he withdrew, and Christine glared at the gaping crew of popular kids as she messed up her dress in a way that made it look as if she was straightening it.

The popular kids were crowded in Scooby-Doo formation in front of the alcove, having turned around from where the stairs exited in front of the door into the more visible parts of the alcove. Jake and Rich were still on the stairs, leaning over the banister at the two of them and gaping. From Rich’s position he couldn’t see Tyler at all.

Chloe was practically right in front of them with a gaping Brooke behind her, fluffy yellow sweater slipping off her shoulder and a lollipop dangling loose in her hand. Chloe’s mouth had dropped open and she was pointing at the two of them with a shaking finger.

Jeremy was in the back lingering behind the girls, and the look on his face made quite possibly every inch of this struggle worth it, because it was so goddamn hilarious it took all of Michael’s considerable mental fortitude not to break out laughing. The complete horror and mortification helped.

Chloe was practically shaking in her leopard print high heels.“You - Christine! Michael? Christine?!”

“Do you mind!” Christine shrieked, face red and expression scrunched up in embarrassment. “I’m busy!”

“Oh my god,” Brooke said flatly.

“Christine, what are you doing!” Chloe’s world was disintegrating around her. Nothing made sense. The foundations of her cold, uncaring planet had betrayed her for the last time and she was left adrift in a sea of confusion. “That’s Michael Mell! He’s a loser! A gay loser! What are you doing making out with him in a stairwell!”

“What do you think I’m doing!” Christine’s voice had reached an impossibly high pitch. “Go away, you’re embarrassing me!”

“Guys, maybe we should leave her alone.” Jake looked uncomfortable, descending the stairwell. He gave Michael a thumbs-up. “Congrats, dude. Treat her right.”

Michael nodded solemnly, pasting on his best embarrassed but proud face. “Will do.”

“Wait,” Rich said, tearing himself away from the bizarre scene. Michael knew how he felt. “Whatever happened to you practically killing Jeremy at that party?”

Jake shrugged. “Mell’s not my bro. He ain’t breaking bro code.”

“Forget masculinity!” Chloe pointed an accusatory finger at Michael, who tried his best to look anything other than innocent. “Everyone knows Michael’s gay!”

Jeremy made a noise roughly approximating a tea kettle. His face hadn’t slipped out of its horrified expression.

“Bisexual people exist,” Michael said cooly, sticking his hands in his jacket.

Chloe stepped back, flustered for whatever reason. “I mean yeah, of course they do, but you’re -”

“Are you participating in bisexual erasure?” Christine demanded. “Chloe, you know how I feel about homophobia!”

“I know,” Chloe said, unreasonably embarrassed. Behind her Brooke was also flushed red. “I mean, I guess he could - but everyone knows he’s been totally stalking Jeremy.”

“I was stalking Christine the whole time,” Michael said quickly, slinging his arm around her. He didn’t know how his life had come to this but once again he was forced to accept bizarre turn of events as they happened. “She was just always hanging out with Jeremy. It was all just a miscommunication.”

“Michael and I are very happy!” Christine said severely. “And you’re all being super duper rude! Stop picking on Michael!”

“I don’t pick on Michael,” Chloe said quickly, backtracking from when she was picking on Michael five seconds ago, “I love bisexual people. They exist all the time, I’m such a fan.”

From behind her Rich narrowed his eyes.

Actually, for some reason everybody in the room was nodding along with her and looking extremely embarrassed. Michael began to have a faint suspicion about something here.

“How did you not hear us come down the stairs?” Brooke asked. “We were pretty loud.”

Christine and Michael settled for glancing at each other and looking sheepish. Michael retreated his arm and coughed, and Christine twirled her hair on her finger. “Um.”

Jeremy basically looked like he was about to drop dead.

The five stages of grief passed through Chloe’s face, and he saw acceptance finally settle onto her finely manicured brow. The acceptance metamorphosed into glee. She whipped out her phone. “I cannot wait to tell everyone I know.”

“How about you don’t!” Christine’s shriek could have broken glass this time, and everybody covered their ears. “Leave me and Michael alone!”

“But -” Chloe protested.

Brooke raised a hand. “I’m not sure that’s going to -”

“How did the fag get a girlfriend?” Rich asked loudly.

Jake hit him casually on the head. “Don’t make fun of my ex’s new boyfriend!”

Jeremy didn’t say anything.

Thanks to Michael’s long history of being a complete stalker he knew that Jeremy took point in these decisions. Chloe was the driving force but Jeremy was the final word, and his silence had been noted.

The group turned to him as one, servants to their king, prostrates to their God. Michael wondered, not for the first time, what Jeremy had given up to gain that power. He wondered if Jeremy thought it had been worth it.

He had taken too long to school his expression. Everyone saw the horror and incredulity on his face before he schooled it into the appropriate surprised yet cool look. He never ran hot or cold, only cool, but he had always been an open book to Michael.

He stuck his hands in his pockets and leaned back slightly on his heels, looking down his nose at Michael. “We should respect Christine’s wishes,” he said eagerly yet firmly. Everyone around him nodded, as if they had just had the idea themselves. “I’m happy for her. I hope you’re…” he broke off, pressing his lips together. “Good together.”

“The rumor mill churns and burns, Mell!” Rich cried out, leaning over the banister with his eyes alight in something that was a cross between revenge and excitement. “You can’t stop the smartphone hour! Everyone always finds out in the end!”

“Yeah,” Michael said, just as Christine grabbed his hand towed him towards the door in apparent embarrassment even as Rich’s laugh echoed in the stairwell, “we’re counting on it.”

They escaped the cool kids together with her small hand in his, hoping desperately that Tyler would be okay. They skidded the corner, running for reasons they didn’t understand, sick to the stomach at the thought of a boy who loved Rich Goranski once upon a time, at a Rich Goranski who was worth loving. They practically tripped over their feet as they landed at the double doors to the theater room, pressing it open as if the popular kids were going to follow them because they knew, they knew everything, because Michael and Christine couldn’t outrun the frantic beating of their hearts that sang a true and vibrant dose of fear teenagers never should have to feel.

Michael and Christine collapsed in the room, hands still interlocked, fear only mitigated by each other.

The theater looked looked at them, accepted the fact that Christine had just sprinted across the school, and went back to their read throughs of the new play. Thank god for the self-absorption of theater kids. A bomb could go off and they wouldn’t break character. Just like how Christine was faced with the possible brainwashing of her friends and she didn’t break character.

“It could be anyone,” Christine panted, “it could have been Chloe and Brooke and Jake too. If it could be Rich it could be any of them.”

“Are we seriously fake dating now?” Michael asked, pushing himself up and giving Christine a hand. “Because that is some serious rom com type shit.”

“It was the first thing I thought of,” Christine said sheepishly. “I mean, I am trapping you in dark corners a lot. I know it was out of left field and a little improbable since you’re gayer than The Village People, but I was so scared and that really wasn’t my finest performance -”

“Are you kidding?” Michael burst out, throwing up his hands. “You were amazing! The way you were just so embarrassed and how you defended me, and when you pressed the bisexual thing they got so ridiculously defensive they forgot all about us. It was perfect!”

The encouragement worked, because Christine pepped up a little as her fear began to recede for favor of her all consuming love of acting. “You totally pulled off the guy caught making out with a cute girl in the stairwell thing too! And did you just see the look on their faces?”

Michael couldn’t help but snicker. “Did you see Jeremy’s? It was priceless!”

“I told you he liked you!” Christine crowed. “Oh, now he’s so jealous!”

“I feel like a dick,” Michael laughed, “but anything’s worth it to see that asshole get taken down a peg or two.”

A new fire lit in Christine’s eyes, and she clenched her fist and raised to the sky. “I know my acting skills would come in handy in a non theater related situation someday,” she whispered ferociously. “This was my destiny. This was my fate.”

But if anything was fate it was the lunch bell ringing, as on some level they were all forced to understand but could never quite accept. The theater kids scurrying around in their endless work groaned, reluctantly rolling up their set pieces and swapping their cans of paint for backpacks and lunchboxes. It was time to get back to their normal lives, as if the fate of their little suburban world wasn’t at stake. It was the only world Michael knew and he stood as its defender. Him and Christine, now. His fake girlfriend. That he made up to hide from his real occasionally hostile acquaintance with benefits. Because it was possible an entire high school had gotten brainwashed and that the strange epidemic had migrated to their school through ground zero of a nusto.

Michael reached out and caught Christine’s wrist, and she slipped it down so they were holding hands again. Her hand was little and dainty and a bit sweaty right about now, but it was very warm. “After two or three years of this Rich went off the deep end,” Michael whispered. “When’s that going to happen to Jeremy?”

She just squeezed his hand. There wasn’t a lot to say.

“We won’t give up.”

“Are you kidding?” Michael found a grin, giving her the thumbs up. She smiled and reciprocated it. “We suck at that.”

He spent the next period fantasizing about platonically marrying Christine and going to all of her Broadway shows. She would be amazing. Maybe they could write their own autobiographical play about the one time they stopped the world from being taken over by pod people through a combination of intrepid journalism, grit and vigor, and a lot of very masculine punching people in the face. Christine could play herself and he could be played by somebody cooler than he was.

The rumor was going to get out. For God’s sake, it was Chloe and Brooke - Jeremy was powerful but not omnipotent. Either way they were going to be hanging out a lot more in the future and a lot more after school, if only for mutual protection against forces of evil that might mug them in the night, and the whole fake dating thing would draw attention away from it.

It would also draw attention away from him and Jeremy.

He had done so many other difficult things that day it had become almost easy to sit down next to Wilson in Spanish and talk to him, who blushed for whatever reason. It was even nice, especially when they were trying to translate chatlog lingo into Spanish. It was like an exhalation after the long and stressful day. From a battle of wills against Jeremy Heere to discovering the conspiracy went deeper than they thought to a new fake relationship with a very awesome fake girl to have a relationship with was a lot for any given day.

His life had gotten pretty surreal lately. It was kind of awesome, if horrible.

Also? Still having regular sex. With Jeremy Heere. Him being questionably evil didn’t really hamper the whole thing as much as he thought it should, especially since he went into the whole thing knowing that he was evil and being slightly turned on by that.

Score.

It wasn’t a productive train of thought but it was one he couldn’t stop having. He sat in last period, nodding his head uncomfortably to the depiction of the witch hunts in the Crucible, trying to look at his notes instead of the back of Jeremy’s head.

He wasn’t as suave and cool as he had been yesterday. He was definitely on edge - bouncing his foot, jerking his head halfway to looking at Michael but never quite doing it. Brooke was saying something to him in a low voice, possibly concerned about him, possibly concerned about how low Christine’s standards had fallen. Jenna, from where she was sitting next to them, was obviously trying to eavesdrop. Yeah. The sands in the hourglass of the smartphone hour couldn’t be stopped if you tried. So maybe it was better not to try.

Eventually, in a stunning display of maturity, Michael stopped thinking about Jeremy and actually went back to work. With long practice he had it pretty much down to a science, and was doing a rocking job not thinking about him every thirty seconds that he almost missed Jeremy walking past him.

He slowed down, ostensibly to become suddenly fascinated in a knick-knack on the teacher’s desk, and Michael just barely heard him say in low tones, “You have to go to the bathroom in five minutes.”

Then he left, probably for the bathroom himself. Well, if he said so then it must be true.

Michael practically counted out the seconds until he thrust his hand in the air, and he knew that no matter what he wasn’t going to get a lot of contemplation about the Crucible done that day. That poor play. Maybe it was actually good.

When he slipped out the door, leaving the melodic tones of the teacher and the crash-boom-bang of the classroom behind him, he had just enough time to stroll easily along the hallway with his hands in his pockets wondering if Jeremy actually thought a bathroom was discreet enough to talk in when there were probably about five stoners in there. Then he saw Jeremy leaning against a door in the hallway, arms crossed and glaring bloody murder at him.

Michael remembered his realization last night about power dynamics and kept himself serene as he strolled down the hall, hands in his jacket pockets.

He smiled at Jeremy, the cat who caught the canary. “Yo.”

The minute he was close enough Jeremy caught him by the elbow, opened the door he was leaning against, and jerked them both inside what quickly proved to be a supply closet.

At least it was lit this time. It had a row of trash cans for students to throw their stuff into and one of those cleaning carts the ladies towed around. It was larger than the stairwell but not by much, smelling like flaking caulk and cleaning supplies, and it was slightly stuffy but not sweaty like the stairwell. The gross factor was drastically, though not completely, lessened, and as Jeremy glared bloody murder at him, face ruddy with anger, Michael wondered what his fan club would think about him now. Spitting mad, hiding in a supply closet with a loser, jealous and insecure.

It was over. In this, at least, Michael had won. No more playing around. The truth, as Michael’s personal hero Fox Mulder had one said, is out there. Lingering in a supply closet.

At least the yellowed light switch on the wall had been flipped, a weak luminescent light painting a faint orange and lemon glow on them.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Jeremy hissed.

This was going to be hilarious. Michael shrugged innocently. “Going to the bathroom?”

“Don’t play dumb with me, Mell.” His eyes were narrowed, biceps flexing as he clenched his fists. Hot. “I mean you and Christine.”

“I was under the impression I was making out with her in the stairwell,” Michael said innocently, “but you could also say that I’m showing her the love and affection she deserves as a hard working and sweet woman making her way in the cutthroat environment of amateur theater.”

Jeremy made a hilarious sound in the back of his throat, a cross between a tea kettle and a chihuahua. Michael was absolutely sure that his baritone was fake. “You and - her and making out - stairwells - Christine? I thought you and me were,” he made a gesture with his hand difficult to interpret, “you know, yeah? Right?”

“Why, Jeremy,” Michael said, voice dripping sincerity as he put his hand on his heart. “But you made it so clear we weren’t dating!”

He faltered. “I mean, we aren’t, but -”

“Don’t tell me our acquaintanceship with benefits thing was exclusive?”

“But now you’d be cheating on her -”

“We have an open relationship,” Michael said blithely, praying for forgiveness to Christine. Jeremy’s jaw dropped. “She knows I’m seeing someone on the side. Don’t worry, she has no idea it’s you.”

“She could find out,” Jeremy said weakly, shaking his head. “No, there’s no way. She has fucking Aspergers, no way would she figure us out. She has no way of knowing.”

And that, Michael thought to himself, is why you’ll lose.

He made his eyes wide and earnest and said, “So this is a good thing! If people know I’m dating Christine then they’ll never suspect I’m sleeping with you. It won’t be suspicious at all if we were seen hanging out now. Our secret has never been safer.”

“But you’re gay -”

“I’m bisexual,” Michael added, knowing that this would probably be the hardest part to sell, “bisexual erasure is a real and serious problem, Jeremy. You’re bisexual, you can’t turn that on yourself. Maybe I can forge new grounds in making a precedent that bisexual people aren’t ashamed to show themselves in public with their friends!”

Jeremy winced. “I’m not…”

“Not what?”

“Never mind.” Jeremy set his jaw, looking away. “You can’t do this, Michael. Stop seeing her, right now. You’re supposed to be with me, you can’t run around dating someone else.”

Oh, wow, okay. They were playing that game. But Michael kept himself calm, knowing that whoever broke first broke forever, knowing that everything depended on Jeremy breaking first. “But I thought we weren’t together.”

“We aren’t,” Jeremy said stiffly. “You’re acting like a moron sleeping around like this.”

“Christine and I are waiting for marriage.” Michael grinned as Jeremy choked on his spit. He added innocently, “I just don’t know why you’re upset. What’s going on between us doesn’t mean anything.”

Jeremy pressed his lips together. “That doesn’t mean -”

“I really like Christine,” Michael said honestly. “She’s funny and cute and she’s whip-smart, and she thinks on her feet and is the most determined person I’ve ever met. I really think our relationship can turn into something great. It’s nothing like what we have.” Michael smiled again as Jeremy’s face fell. “What we have is just sex. That’s why you never stay afterwards and that’s why you make fun of me if god forbid I even ask. And that’s why you keep taking out your internalized homophobia on me and not only not letting yourself be seen with me in public, but be actively mean to me. It’s just sex. It’s not like you actually like me or anything.”

Jeremy went white.

“I like you just fine,” Jeremy said, “just not like that -”

“Then why are you jealous?”

There it was. He turned beet red again and practically squeaked. It was adorable. “I’m not jealous!”

Score. He was being such a dick right now but turnabout was fair play and it was for a good cause. He batted his eyes. “Then you have no problem with me and Christine, right?”

“I have such a problem it’s not even funny -”

“It’s pretty hilarious to me how you pulled me into a broom closet, started yelling at me, told me I can’t see her, and how now you’re telling me you aren’t jealous.”

He opened his mouth, then closed it. He had no leg to stand on. “It’s not fair to her to be seeing me on the side -”

“Why not?” Michael shrugged. “She knows I’m seeing someone, and she knows that he has horrible internalized homophobia. If you have such a problem with it tell her yourself.”

“I can’t do that -”

“She dates me and I’m bisexual.” Michael said reasonably. “She’d have no problem. So why can’t you do that?”

“Look, I just want you to stop -”

“Last time I checked you can’t control what I do,” Michael said severely, and Jeremy shut up. “I haven’t broken any one of your stupid rules. Nobody knows. I’m not talking to you in public. I don’t care about you and you don’t care about me and obviously we mean nothing to each other, which is why you’re perfectly fine with me getting over my gigantic homo crush on you and dating a nice, respectable straight girl. It works out great for you, Jeremy.” He stepped forwards and Jeremy stepped back, even as Michael’s voice was even and calm, not hissing or yelling but only ever delivering his final statement with a blank face. “Unless you liked stringing me along, being with someone who likes you just because you need even more attention than you already have.”

“I don’t,” Jeremy said, face crumpled. “I wouldn’t do that.”

“I know,” Michael said honestly. “But it’s either that or you have to admit that you actually like me.”

They stood in silence for a hot second, Jeremy’s eyes far away. Probably having those weird internal conversations with himself again - Michael could see his mouth moving. One of his weird internal conversations that he played hangman and Chutes and Ladders with, but didn’t like playing Monopoly with. He didn’t like playing Monopoly with the voices in his head. Weirdo.

In the next moment, as if nothing ever happened, Jeremy shook his head as if batting away flies and said, “No, you’re wrong. You’re - you’re delusional.”

“You like crabby patties,” Michael said, delighted. “Don’t you, Squidward?”

“Stop referencing vintage cartoons!”

“Face it, you like me,” he said, drawing out the ‘like’ obnoxiously long, “you like me.”

“I do not!”

“Jeremy likes Michael,” he sang, “Jeremy likes Michael!”

He clapped his hands over his ears. “I can’t hear you!”

“You do! Just admit it!”

“Under no circumstances!”

“Under no circumstances will you admit it or under no circumstances do you like me?”

“The former - I mean latter! Both!”

“Someone’s in denial,” Michael sang. “Someone’s in denial!”

“I am not in denial!”

“Then just admit it!”

“Fine!” Jeremy screamed, “I like you! Happy? I really, really like you! Now stop quoting Spongebob!”

Michael kissed him, and Jeremy kissed back, and he really hoped nobody had heard Jeremy yell that because there would be a lot of awkward questions if they did.

They separated, then Michael kissed him again, and Jeremy lightly peeled him off looking thoroughly freaked out.

“Told you I’d get you to admit it,” Michael said, smug. “Christine is such a wingman.”

“Oh my god,” Jeremy said faintly, pressing a hand to his forehead. “I’m - I’m gay now. This makes me gay.”

“Holy shit, this is what makes you gay? Really, this? Not the sex?”

“Shut up,” Jeremy said absently, because he was still a dick. “Oh my god. I like a loser.”

“You’ve been having sex with the loser!”

“Shut up,” Jeremy said again. “This is horrible. Man, he’s going to kill me. He’s gonna - yep, you’re already killing me, you shut up too. No, sorry, I didn’t mean to tell you to shut up. Christ. I can’t handle this.”

“Is that why you took like two weeks to admit it?”

“Oh my god,” Jeremy said, burying his head into Michael’s shoulder. Michael laughed and hugged him, glad that they were able to do that. He was so much bigger than Christine, all tough muscle instead of soft fat, and no offense to Christine but way, way cuter. “Oh my god I legitimately died when I saw you kissing her. It felt like someone dipped my heart in liquid nitrogen. And I was all like - look, it’s a feeling! And actual feeling!”

Michael rubbed his back consolingly. “And that’s...rare?”

“So rare,” Jeremy said morosely, and that honestly explained a lot. “I’ve had, like, so many feelings over the past two weeks. I hated all of them. But they were kind of nice, too. Especially because they were nice.”

“I’d like it if you felt them with me,” Michael said quietly. “I think that’d be nice too.”

“Am I a faggot?” Jeremy asked miserably.

Michael hugged him tight, as tight as he possibly could, and said the only thing he knew how to say. “Yep. Welcome to the club, man. We got rainbow cookies, pride flags, and free love.”

“Love as far as the eye can see,” Jeremy said faintly.

“Where nobody hates themselves and everything will always be okay.” He pulled back from Jeremy a little so he could look him in the eyes, frowning. “Jeremy, I - nobody’s born hating themselves. Not just for the gay thing, for everything. Somebody taught you to hate every single thing about yourself. Sorry, dude, but your self-esteem is ridiculously horrible and - and it makes you mean. Mean to other people and mean to yourself. Who taught you to be like that? Who taught you to hate yourself? Because it’s not right. You don’t deserve that. You’re a good person as you are. I just want to meet that person more.”

Jeremy was silent.

For a second Michael was afraid that Jeremy wouldn’t say anything. Irrationally, it felt like he would never say anything again, only staring at the shelf full of Oxyclean and toilet paper, eyes distant. He twitched a little. Michael was almost surprised when he spoke. “He loves me.”

The hairs on the back of his neck rose. “Who’s he?”

“He loves me, you don’t get it.” Jeremy looked away, shaking his head, “Those things, he - he’s always right, he deserves to say those things to me. He’s always right. I’m a loser. You wouldn’t understand, nobody could, only Rich - he loves me, Michael.”

“That’s not what love looks like,” Michael said.

But Jeremy was just shaking his head again, and he withdrew completely, and started holding it in his hands. “You don’t get it, he - I told you. He’s always right. I just have to apologize. Michael, please don’t ask me about this again. He’s not going to let me see you anymore.”

Michael’s blood ran cold, but he scrambled for his calm. He knew what he was about to say would be important, even if he had no idea how or why. “I won’t ask anymore,” Michael said smoothly. “Hey, of course he cares about you. Right?”

“Right,” Jeremy nodded, still looking unsteady. He licked his lips. “Right, see - I told you he would agree with you, okay? We’re okay. I care about you, Michael, even though…” he faltered, but whatever he was about to say trailed off. “You make my head hurt when you say stuff like that.”

He had to tell Christine. The minute they got out of here and the bell rang Michael was going to have to sprint to the theater room, tell Christine everything, how their mysterious and malevolent entity was a voice inside everybody’s head that loved them and that only wanted them to be their best selves.

That perfect world wasn’t so bad. Everyone was popular, and everyone was happy, and nobody was gay.

“I’ll never mention it again,” Michael promised. He mentally crossed his fingers behind his back, but it seemed to have the desired effect. Jeremy perked up and Michael had the sense that the voice was mollified, if at least for now.

Jeremy leaned in closer on him, and it was as if the fear hasn’t even been there. He smiled, that one particular smile Michael had only ever seen be for him. It was excited. “God, you can’t believe how jealous I was.”

“Michael has two hands,” Michael said automatically.

“Is that another old meme I don’t get? Why can’t you just point at a piece of wood and call it The Destroyer like everyone else does?”

“Hey, they’re classics for a reason.”

Jeremy hummed, hooking Michael’s collar with a thumb. “You’re such a loser.”

“Hey, that was mean. Now I need you to say three nice things about me.”

Jeremy pretended to think about it, smiling down at him. “Well, you’re super hot.”

It was embarrassing, but Michael almost wanted to giggle. They had injokes now. It was like they were actually friends or something. “Try harder.”

“Well,” Jeremy drawled out obnoxiously, looking Michael up and down. “How about just one really nice thing?”

“I mean, depends on how nice it is - I’m expecting a niceness combined score of at least twelve out of ten here.”

Then Jeremy smiled, and leaned forwards to quickly kiss him.

“I’ve been wanting to do this since I saw you with her.”

Then he bent down and grabbed Michael’s fly.

“Wait,” Michael said, “what?”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm pretty sure I'm the only person in this fandom who can claim to have written a fake dating Michael/Christine AU. It's a burden I have to bear.


	4. Chapter 4

 

In that way Michael found himself in the unique position of being in a generally duplicitous in different ways to differing groups of people in a polyamorous relationship where one part pretended not to know the other one was happening and was probably not into guys and they were actively working against the other part, who didn’t know it was both fake and platonic and also didn’t know that they were actively conspiring against the other part and also didn’t, and that was the part he was having sex with instead of the other part, who he was absolutely not having sex with because he was lying about being bisexual.

“My life’s gotten complicated,” Michael said.

“That’s nice, honey,” his mother said. “Pass the peas.”

It was also worth noting that the general public didn’t know that one part of this relationship was happening because they still thought that part was straight. Said part had also only actually admitted out loud he was gay that day, despite having propositioned him two weeks ago. It was also worth noting that both of these parts were ridiculously popular and that one of them apparently heard voices that were really mean to him that may or may not actually be related to a far reaching conspiracy where best friends turn evil and entire schools turn into pod people.

“Is this because I stole some communion wine from the church when I was thirteen? Is that why God is doing this to me?”

His mother spooned more rice into her mouth without looking up from her plate. “Honey, God doesn’t hate you because you stole wine. God hates you because you’re gay.”

Michael choked on his peas as his father sighed. “Althea, I read in those parenting books that saying those things isn’t good for child development.”

“Parenting books are garbage. Are they the parent of my son? They are not.” His mother stabbed her fork at his father, who only rolled his eyes. “I am the expert in parenting. Michael, tell your father what an excellent mother I am.”

“I could take her or leave her.”

“The books said I had to be supportive when we found out you were gay,” his father encouraged, cutting into his green beans. “But they gave me no advice when you broke into my weed stash when you were fourteen.”

“You let me do that,” Michael said flatly. “Besides, I’m bisexual now.”

His parents dropped their forks and stared at him, eyes wide, before breaking out into uproarious laughter. His father slapped the table bellowing in laughter and his mother started wheezing, clutching her fork.   

“It’s true!” Michael protested. “I totally have a girlfriend now!” Fake girlfriend, and also male FWB, but still. “She’s very respectable, Mom. She does musical theater. And she’s asian!”

“Please,” his mother sniffed, finishing her cackling in order to show the socially acceptable amount of derision for racism, “ethnicity has nothing to do with a woman’s value as a partner and a person.” Her expression darkened. “Unless she’s Chinese.”

“Mom!” Christine was, in fact, Chinese. “Look, I’m engaging in an intricate game here. Like - like chess. High school is complicated. My life is even more complicated. The world? It’s a complicated place, Mom. Mom.”

“I’m kidding, I’m kidding. Of course you’re allowed to date a Chinese boy.” She wiped her mouth with a napkin, throwing it down. “Honey, when you were seven you were planning out your wedding with Jaden Smith.”

“We were made for each other,” Michael hissed, “and that’s not the point! It’s called a social tactic. I’m bisexual now and I know exactly what I’m doing.” He did not, but that was not the point.

His mother just sighed, the same way she sighed when Michael told her he was going to marry Jaden Smith. Joke’s on her, Jaden Smith aged like a fine wine. He was in last summer’s blockbuster, ‘The Mirror of Her Eyes’. An instant classic.

“I just hope that poor girl you’re dating knows she’s a beard.”

“Trust me, she’s well aware,” Michael said blithely. “She’s just being a wingwoman slash co-conspirator and helping me cover up our investigations into a conspiracy.”

“Oh, well in that case.”

The next morning he drove himself and Christine to school on barely five hours of sleep, and they were forced to walk to class together both rubbing their eyes and yawning. Michael had been up late that night stressing out over the entire ludicrously complicated affair, texting Christine who was doing the exact same thing, and trying to make flowcharts together in an attempt to make sense of their lives.

It would have been so much easier if he could just tell Jeremy that he was fake dating her, but then he would have had to say that he was only fake dating her to make him jealous and Michael did not even want Jeremy to think he was that petty. Making him jealous was a pleasant side effect.

It was hard not to feel paranoid walking into school that day. It felt like everyone was staring at him, which was a hard deviation from the usual. It could have been because he was standing next to Christine, but some of the anxiety undoubtedly came from the fact that any one of their peers could be pod people.

The ebb and flow of teenagers flowing through the campus, the way they clung like moss to corners of the school and benches in the courtyard, everything became suspect. The kids playing hacky sack in front of the gym, the crowd of girls sitting in an empty classroom doing last minute homework before class started, the skateboarders sitting on a brick fence and smoking. Maybe among the skateboarders there was a champion level quality athlete, who had the balance of a whale one day but woke up the next with some sick flips.

Judging from the way Christine kept biting her lip and darting her eyes side to side she had to be thinking the same thing. Michael smiled at her and slipped his hand into hers and gave it a tight squeeze, and she smiled in relief up at him.

“Out of all the people I’m in this with that I met literally two days ago,” Christine said, “I’m glad it’s you.”

“Our bond was rapid but unbreakable,” Michael agreed. He saw Chloe and Brooke emerge from the crowd in front of them, waving as Christine beamed at them and waved too. “Quick, act heterosexual.”

“Difficult, but I’ll do my best.”

“Hah!” Michael crowed. “I knew it!”

He would have to get Christine’s true sexuality out of her later. Brooke and Chloe were standing at their usual cool kid spot right in front of the library, where they had an uninterrupted view of the campus and, more importantly, where everyone could see them. He regularly caught the girls honest to god posing for the boys walking past, even as their own popular boys pretended to fist fight each other. Popular kids! So deep, so complex!

Approaching them suddenly put Michael into a cold sweat, and he began digging his heels in before Christine jammed her elbow into his waist and hissed at him to act natural. It was, in fact, extremely natural for someone like Michael to panic on entering the same restraining order radius as the cool kids. Rich had mildly beat him up a few weeks ago, and the girls had been painfully incredulous that he and Christine were together.

Some nervousness was reasonable and encouraged. Some paranoia too - if both Jeremy and Rich were pod people, did that mean Chloe, Brooke, and Jake were too? Chloe was a real danger here.

Michael bent his head down and pretended to kiss her on the forehead, instead whispering, “Keep an eye on Chloe. She might be one of them.”

Christine giggled happily and waved to her friends as they approached before adding in a lower tone, “I’m on it. Watch Rich for me.”

He couldn’t help but grimace, and Christine laughed.

Sure enough, Chloe and Brooke were sitting on the three or four stairs that lead to the library door from its small hill opening the way to the southern building from the courtyard. There was a small brick wall extending from either side as they wound down the wheelchair ramp that Rich was standing on, pretending to kick Jake in the head from where he stood next to him. Jeremy’s back was turned to him, playing on his phone. He subtly jerked his head left and right, as if trying to escape from a persistent voice in his head.

Michael could talk all the crap he wanted to about creepy pod people and how they had infiltrated the school, how he could scream ‘You’re Next!’ all he wanted. It became less black and white when his FWB was a pod person.

Was...was that unethical?

He had been right all along. He had been sleeping with the enemy. He just hadn’t understood who the true enemy was.

Christine’s bouncy ball ways became far more overwhelming when you were holding her hand, and Michael found himself being tugged every which way as he unceremoniously infiltrated the in crowd. It really was that easy.

“So the new boyfriend joins us,” Chloe drawled, crossing her arms and tapping her fake nails in a steady rhythm against her forearm. Brooke copied her, slightly off beat. Maybe not that easy.  “Is he going to captain the track and field team now too?”

“Yeah,” Brooke said, “or would you have to quit the chess team?”

Something very thunderous and very scary roared across Christine’s face and the other two girls, probably unused to seeing Christine’s incredible temper turned on themselves, reeled back. “Excuse me,” Christine said brightly, like lightning, “I would hate for my new boyfriend to have a bad first impression of my friends.”

The two girls looked incredulous, as if anybody needed a first impression of them, much less if his impression of them was important. But Christine’s face hadn’t stopped doing its Thor, God of Thunder impression, so they quickly retreated.

Michael scrubbed at his hair, supremely uncomfortable. “I can go.”

“Don’t be silly,” Christine said, whapping his arm, “we love making new friends. Especially when the friends are as nice as Brooke and Chloe!” She turned the thunderous gaze of God upon them, and the queen bees cowered. “Isn’t that right?”

“Of course!” Brooke squeaked. “Friend of Christine’s a friend of mine!”

“Bisexual people definitely exist,” Chloe chimed in quickly. “Right, guys?”

Rich was practically dancing on the wall, pretending to kick Jake’s head and turning it into a side sweep. He was surprisingly graceful, if carrying his moves with a particular drunken fist style. He snickered, and in one smooth motion he pushed himself up into a handstand, shirt falling upwards. Chloe, Brooke, and Michael made it perfectly obvious how much they enjoyed the view. Jake, from where he was standing next to him, blushed and looked away. Jeremy still had his back turned to them, playing with his phone.

“Do you want to know why we call gay people faggots?” Rich asked, and his upside down cheshire grin was turned into a demented scowl. Everyone except Jeremy cringed. “It’s because a faggot means a bundle of sticks. In ye fuck olden days folks used to burn the queers through tying them to stakes and throwing faggots onto the fires. Eventually they started calling them faggots, because their melted flesh used to sink into the ash of the firewood until they were one and the same.” Rich grinned, doing a headstand push up. “I read that on the back of a cereal box.”

Jake, Chloe, and Brooke were gaping at him, horrified. Without another word Jeremy turned around, hopped down the steps, and kicked Rich on the chest so hard he flew off the wall and landed face first onto the cement.

Brooke screamed and Chloe bolted upright from her seat, eyes wide and dancing back and forth from Jeremy to Rich and back to Jeremy. Jake ran to make sure Rich was okay as Jeremy stuck his hands in his pockets, looking down his nose at Rich with an expression so implacable it was furious.

“We don’t say that shit anymore,” Jeremy said. He looked around at the others, who looked desperately grateful for some authority. “None of that shit. He’s here, fucking deal with it.”

Despite everything, Michael held a grin behind his hand. He could almost swear that Jeremy looked at him before he turned back to his phone, bored again.

Jake was quietly bent over Rich, asking him if he was okay, but it was a well known fact that Rich did not feel pain. He laughed, higher and higher, rolling himself back upwards. His nose was bloody.

“Whatever happened to free speech? So much for the tolerant left.”

“You’re lucky I know that wasn’t free speech,” Jeremy said dryly. “So shut the fuck up.”

Rich laughed again, high and plasticy, and in that moment it was impossible to forget that he was a pod person. “You’ll have to find my off switch first! Get it? Ha, ha!”

Chloe shook her head, face white. “You’re more of a psycho than usual today, Rich.”

“Everybody just calm down,” Jake said lamely. “Rich, buddy, come on, let’s take a walk.”

Incredibly, Rich let Jake shepherd him away, saying something quietly about getting some tissue paper for the nose, and the others watched in silence as the boys went.

“Well,” Chloe said brightly, clapping her hands, “that went well.”

“Wow,” Michael drawled loudly, “I love your friends, Christine. I can tell we’re all going to get along great.”

“Good thing you and I are going to have some alone time during lunch,” Christine said, equally loudly. “Because I sure as heck don’t trust the people who I thought were supposed to care about me around a perfectly decent person like you!”

Everybody cringed, even Jeremy.

The rest of the day passed by in a blur of surreptitiously texting Christine and waiting for Jeremy to surreptitiously text him. He did not.

On the bright side, the fun little display before school gave them perfect excuse to have some alone time in the theater room, as much as choreographing the armies of theater kids could reasonably be said to be alone time. The girl literally never let up. Michael perched on the desk next to the one she stood on, feeling like the queen consort and watching her minions scurry. He thought gleefully about how many miniature theater hearts he was breaking - judging from the looks on some of the freshmen’s faces it was quite a lot.

A girl who looked to be some sort of second in command, with bright blue bantu knots and an ironic overly large Nirvana t-shirt over distressed jeans, crossed her arms and stared down a Christine brandishing a giant assistant stage manager binder and Michael brandishing the peanut butter sandwich he was making for her out of supplies he found in the teacher’s lounge.

“You are not trying to tell me you just got a new boyfriend and you are completely ignoring him.”

“I don’t feel that ignored,” Michael volunteered, passing Christine the sandwich before making his own. Christine stuffed it in her mouth to avoid answering the question.

The girl pinched the bridge of her mouth and pointed out the door. “Out. I’ll take care of this. Go have fun!”

Christine mumbled something desolate through her sandwich.

“Go!”

They went.

They wandered around the hallways a little, lost now that Michael didn’t feel like sitting with the Yugioh club if he didn’t have to and that Christine didn’t feel like subjecting him to her popular friends that she normally ate lunch with.

They halted in the middle of the hallway, shuffling their feet and awkwardly looking at each other.

“I feel like I majorly threw a wrench in your life,” Michael admitted, flipping his headphones up and down. “I’m so sorry, Christine.”

“Are you kidding?” Christine declared hotly. “I was so mortified when Rich said that horrible stuff earlier! It’s my friends who are awful.”

“Hey, they’re my FWB’s friends too,” Michael offered weakly. “I might as well, right?”

They faltered, staring at each other and then away.

“Do you want to compile evidence for our report to the FBI about the hidden evil in a sleepy New Jersey suburb?” Christine asked plainly.

“God, yes.”

By the end of lunch not only did they have a dossier, but the dossier was in a beautiful binder, color coded, and marked with helpful tabs at the most incriminating evidence. They had done the best they could considering the fact that they had assembled it hiding in the back room of the library behind the circulation desk, where everyone undoubtedly assumed they were making out. As annoying as this fake relationship thing was it was tremendously useful.

To make the pie sweeter he took a selfie of himself and Christine, with her kissing him on the cheek, and sent it to Jeremy. He didn’t deserve it, but it was funny.

Jeremy texted back, the first time of the day.

 **6069238454:** Not funny.

 **Michael Mell:** little funny

He put the phone down as he went back to handwriting an extensive report on their findings. They were both lying on their stomachs on the floor, and Christine was cross referencing the photocopied index of names of the students of the infected school with a list of students in their own school that she obtained through mysterious means.

“We look like we’re safe so far,” she confirmed grimly. “But when you add in the fact that Rich never even went to that other school…”

They looked at each other and shivered.

“We could infiltrate the other school,” Michael said, “maybe confront them.”

“We could also not,” Christine said, “ever.”

“Fair.”

By the time he remembered to pick up the phone again Jeremy had actually texted him back.

 **6069238454:** You’re absolutely sure she doesn’t know anything? She can’t know anything. You have to be careful.

 **Michael Mell** : y

 **6069238454:** She just can’t, okay?

 **Michael Mell:** yyyyyyy

 **6069238454:** She just can’t.

Michael frowned down at the phone. “The voice in Jeremy’s head has an ulterior motive.”

“You mean one besides making Jeremy the Ubermensch, taking over the school, and possibly taking over the world?” Christine didn’t look up from her indices. “Because those are a lot by themselves.”

“He can’t say it’s because you wouldn’t accept him,” Michael said slowly. “And I think I made it pretty clear you’d be open to a polyamorous thing anyway.”

“Nice.”

“I know, right?” He tapped the phone carefully, deep in thought. “You can keep your mouth shut, so you aren’t a security risk. I’m climbing the social ladder by being with you so I’m not some kind of social leper anymore, so thanks for that -”

“You’re welcome.”

“I think Chloe, Brooke, and Jake would be okay with it, and those seem to be his real fake friends anyway. The other uber tier kids may not be but I highly doubt he actually cares about that. I think I helped him through at least a little of his own internalized homophobia. I get us being a secret, even if it’s just for right now. But why from you?”

“Maybe it’s to control him,” Christine said casually, writing some more notes on the report. Then she realized what she said and looked up, eyes wide. “It doesn’t need a reason. Anything that makes him feel alone or isolated, like absolutely nobody knowing about you two, makes him feel bad about himself. I think that’s reason enough.”

Michael looked down at the phone, rubbing his thumb over the glass.

 **6069238454:** When are you two going to start having sex?

He squeaked, almost dropping the phone. “At least now we know why he’s so freaking insecure!”

 **Michael Mell:** We got together literally two days ago chill omfg

Christine looked over his shoulder, eyes wide. “Ew. I didn’t know Jeremy was so gross. I don’t even like sex.”

Yes, he knew it! Michael pushed himself up a little to face her. “Wait, you’re asexual?”

Christine shrugged. “Yeah? I’m not embarrassed. Jake knows.”

“Why doesn’t anybody else know?”

“They never asked?”

 **Michael Mell:** i don’t think she’s into that kind of stuff anyway

 **6069238454:** Sex???

 **6069238454:** Who’s not into sex???

 **Michael Mell:** Asexuality’s a legit sexuality dude, look it up.

Michael typed it out, then looked at it for a long time.

Sometimes Jeremy could be mean to him because of the gay thing. Or bisexual thing now, apparently. He would rather die than inflict his douchey FWB on his fake girlfriend. Or inflict the voice in his FWB’s head that made him do crappy stuff, which depending on how you looked at it could either be his schizophrenia or the brainwashing their new alien overlords gave him.

He deleted the message.

 **Michael Mell:** Christine, apparently. She likes other stuff though ;D

 **6069238454:** whatever

 **Michael Mell:** the other stuff was board games get your mind out of the gutter.

 **6069238454:** yeah ok

“The minute he wants to be exclusive he can just ask,” Michael muttered under his breath, setting the phone aside. “Not that hard.”

For some reason after everything that happened yesterday afternoon Jeremy told him outright to keep seeing Christine, since “it’s not like we’re together and you shouldn’t make too much out of what I said.”

Of course he shouldn’t.

Jeremy had outright admitted to going livid with jealousy yesterday but the minute Michael assured him that they would still be together he had been totally fine with it. He said that it was perfect that Michael was in a relationship now, because then he would have someone who could actually hold his hand in public, and Jeremy got what he wanted anyway.

Michael would have asked him if what they had together was really what Jeremy wanted for them, but he knew that Jeremy wasn’t quite there yet. It had taken him this long to even outright admit that he found Michael both physically and emotionally attractive. And to, you know, stop being mean to him all the time.

“I can’t tell if he’s actually a douche or if he just acts douchey,” Michael complained.

“Is there a difference?” Christine asked. She was pulling out the hard philosophical questions today. “Or does the difference not matter?”

“It should,” Michael said glumly.

The minute he asked, and the minute he would offer something in return, Michael would agree. If nothing else was going on he wouldn’t even have done this in the first place. But if they were caught somewhere they shouldn’t be one time they could be again, and as much as they both felt bad about it their relationship served several dozen purposes.

One of which was finding a weak spot in the pod people, and he could only do that through being close to them. If Jeremy had his way Michael would never step foot in the same hallway as him again, no matter how much he secretly liked him, and that just wasn’t going to do it. He needed to take action. He needed to step away from where he really wanted to be.

“I don’t get you guys,” Christine complained. “He keeps on saying one thing then acting completely differently. He doesn’t have to conform to these stupid laws he set for himself. He could have something really great, like being with you.” She smiled at him. “I mean, I guess I’m with you and it’s been fun so far.”

“Thanks, honey. But what does that voice of his want?” Michael wondered out loud. “And what does it have to do with me?”

They looked at each other uneasily. They wished they knew.

The next day passed similarly, and the next. By the third day of his newfound life he was actually capable of standing in a circle with the popular kids and talking, so long as he wasn’t the one talking. Rich cheerfully hated him, but never said anything so horrible as he did the first day, and after another significant glance from Christine that was becoming increasingly easy to read he had begun taping or writing down almost everything Rich said to him.

When he and Christine pretended to go run off and look lovingly into each other’s eyes again that lunch period, what they saw was damning.

“On a surface level it’s douchey, weird, and slightly disturbing,” Michael said in wonder, hiding in the costume room connected to the theater room with Christine. They went over his list again, and Michael underlined incriminating lines. Lines where Rich had warned him to stay away from Jeremy (twenty stanzas), lines where Rich cast aspersions on Michael’s masculinity and inability to keep a girlfriend (fifteen stanzas, but he had stopped when Christine chucked a textbook at him), and lots of robot jokes (thirty three stanzas, which Michael assumed was code for the fact that their popularity was artificial). “But on a deeper level...it’s douchey, weird, slightly disturbing, and incriminating!”

“Like one of those vinyls that you play backwards and hear a message from Satan!” Christine said, poking another line where Rich said something sexist about how overbearing women are. “Only the opposite, but not opposite in the sense that you should play it forwards instead.”

Michael looked at her in wonder, eyes shining. “You’re the only person I know who knows what a vinyl is.”

She nodded, giving him the thumbs up. “Best fake girlfriend.”

Jeremy had still been giving him a wide berth, so Michael had taken it upon himself to annoy him to death. There were dozens of pictures of the back of Jeremy’s head, of Christine doing something adorable, of Michael doing somethings that, in his own professional opinion, was also equally adorable, and some pretty clouds. This was probably the reason that Jeremy refused to add him on the hip teen instant photo messaging service ClickerConversations. He also refused to add him on Myspace, which was a crying shame.

There was, however, only so wide a berth you can give to someone was ostensibly the boyfriend of someone who was a close friend like Christine. Everybody who was or had ever been a teenager knew this.

The next week the Smash Tournament rolled around again and Michael had been talking excitedly with Wilson about how they were going to bet Drake his Spanish essay on completely wrecking him. They had actually been planning it out, and had even shifted towards talking about other stuff like their favorite map in ORECreation or the weirdest porn they had ever seen Ben watching.

Wilson had actually turned out to be a pretty cool guy once Michael had let go of his dumb ego. The guys had also stopped teasing him about Jeremy and had turned star struck now that he was dating Christine.

It had also taken an embarrassing amount of time to convince them that he was actually bisexual, even if he had always leaned very, very, very, very heavily towards boys. He and Christine had also sucked it up and sucked face in the courtyard before school. But when Jeremy wasn’t there, because Michael wasn’t that much of a dick.

As an apology Christine had cleared the way for Jeremy to pretend to help Michael with his math homework after school. Not a lot of math had gotten done that day.

Michael and Wilson had just waved goodbye to Christine so she could return to her sacred play rehearsal duties and he could walk with Wilson to the computer science room when they caught sight of Rich balancing on top of the back of a bench in the courtyard outside with Jeremy standing next to him, hands in his pockets and talking quietly with him as Rich somehow managed to make a lot of noise and talk quietly too. No, not talking - Jeremy looked like he was hissing at Rich. For two best friends they supposedly argued, insulted, and kicked each other around a lot. Michael had never understood these hyper-masculine male friendships.

Of course, it was likely that Jeremy and Rich were as much co-conspirators as Michael and Christine was. When had their high school turned into a battlefield?

Michael was beginning to resent this evil force or evil voice or evil whatever. Not just hate, as he had always hated it even when he didn’t know what it was, but resent it. He and Jeremy could have had a normal life together. He could have met Jeremy at the Yugioh club, because Jeremy had been a total nerd, and they could play video games together all the time instead of only after sex whenever they could find the time. It had even gotten to the point where they had been blowing off the sex to play, something they had been doing more and more often. Michael knew that it was how things should have been all along, how they should have been if Jeremy hadn’t wasted so much of his life hating himself.

He and Wilson looked at each other. Wilson raised his eyebrows in an ‘are these guys your friends now?’ way, and Michael looked panicked in an ‘under no circumstances’ way. By silent agreement they tried their best to melt into the crowd.

But Jeremy’s own personal attack dog found them both. He hollered, making Michael and Wilson freeze up, and he honest to God did a backflip off of the back of the bench. It would have been pretty hot if Rich hadn’t been evil. Jeremy just rolled his eyes.

“Swell Michael Mell! How’s it banging, how’s it hangin, bro!”

Fuck, he was pretending to be nice. Michael and Wilson glanced at each other again, now thoroughly into panic mode.

“Oh, you know,” Michael said weakly, even as Rich beckoned him forward. If Michael tried to escape he knew from long experience that Rich would actually follow him, so he weakly walked up and made a big show of waving goodbye to Wilson. “See you later, dude, I know you have something really important to get to literally right now, better hurry.”

Rich pressed his hands to his heart, expression falling. “Aw, more important than me? Saddle up, I got a sermon to spread.”

Oh no. Wilson was a vulnerable link. Wilson, who was well aware of this, turned white and reluctantly walked up with Michael too. They both tried to play it cool and both completely obviously failed.

“By sermon,” Michael offered, trying his absolute best not to look uncomfortable and failing, “do you mean, like, life advice, or spreading your religious calling? Because if you found Jesus I’m really proud of you, dude, and I’d like to remind you of the wise words of our Savior where we do unto others and all that.”

Advice. Michael remembered his resolution to listen to the bullcrap Rich sprouted in case there was a diamond in it. The major flaw to this plan was that it would involve talking to Rich.

He carefully reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone, and almost without looking he turned on the tape recorder app. Rich noticed, but he wasn’t sure if the others did.

Rich gasped, hand held dainty to his mouth. Jeremy rolled his eyes, not so much avoiding eye contact with Michael but tolerantly accepting Rich haranguing people he didn’t feel much about. “I just love our lord and savior!” he gushed creepily. “Matthew 5:5 just spoke to me, man.”

Either Rich had made a miscalculation or he had made a weirdly shrewd one, because Michael was Catholic as fuck and he was wearing a St. Michael medallion right now. He narrowed his eyes. “ ‘Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the Earth?’.”

Wilson gave him a bizarre look and Jeremy looked deeply surprised, but Rich only threw his head back and laughed, clapping his hands. “The meek shall inherit, fuckface! You know the Book doesn’t lie. It’s not a question of merit, it’s not demand and supply!” He leaned in, eyes alight with an unearthly glow. “The meek are going to get what’s coming to them, just like every little asshole on this world is going to get what’s coming to them. Everybody in this world is going straight to hell starting with you and ending with me. The meek are going to inherit the Earth which is really fucking inconvenient, because all the devils are here.”

In that second Rich was a fortuneteller, a weathered woman by the side of the road who told you the future if you pressed a coin into her hand. If that wasn’t true than at least Rich thought it was, at least someone like Rich was convinced down to his bones that the world was going straight to hell because the meek like him and Jeremy were set to inherit it. Rich knew better than anyone else that the meek were due to inherit, and inherit soon. And all the devils would be here. Would be Heere.

And the only one who could stop them was Michael, and he didn’t know how to feel about the fact that Rich was begging him for help.

“The only regret I’ve ever had in my life  is meeting you,” Michael said finally, understanding that he had to play it off as if he had no idea what Rich was talking about. Somewhere along the way he had become a co-conspirator too, if by co-conspirator you mean ‘Someone who hates Michael with a fiery burning passion’. It looked like he was playing for both teams. Ha, Ha. “And the fact that they never made another Earthbound game. Come on, Wilson, let’s go.”

“Aw, don’t be like that,” Rich sneered. “You’re my very best friend. You, me, and Jeremy just have this unfortunately unbreakable bond.”

“No we don’t,” Jeremy said flatly.

“So if we’re such good friends what are you doing hanging out with this loser, huh?” Rich jerked a thumb towards Wilson, who clearly wanted to be literally anywhere else other than at the spot Rich was pointing. “You’re going to make us look bad, man. I mean more than you already are.”

“I can hang out with who I want to hang out with,” Michael said, making careful eye contact with both Rich and Jeremy, hoping they understood the three different things he was saying. “If you’ve finished your TED talk then I have a Smash Bros tournament to get to.”

Hilariously, Jeremy perked up from behind Rich, before remembering that it was illegal in Jeremy’s strange Reindeer Games and that he had to pretend not to care again.

“Don’t run away from me, honey,” Rich crooned, and then he grabbed Wilson’s forearm. “Come and stay awhile. Then we can go upstairs to my place and fuck like rabbits.”

Holy shit, what was wrong with this guy. The minute they unbrainwashed him he was going to have some serious explaining to do. Wilson immediately tugged himself out of Rich’s grip, spooked but furious, and Michael immediately stepped in front of him and glared Rich down. Jeremy had pulled forward too and jerked Rich back, as furious as Wilson was

“You need to seriously tone it down,” Jeremy hissed, physically gripping Rich’s shoulder and pushing him back. Rich was tolerantly amused, like he was putting up with everybody. “Stop taking everything out on them.”

“Like you don’t?” Rich sneered. Jeremy blinked, masterfully aborting the wince. “Get a clue, Scooby-Doo. He knows what he’s gotten into. If he thinks he’s so smart he’d say goodbye to his heart, because I’m going to cleave it in two.”

Everybody stopped and stared at him, silently parsing that sentence.

For some reason Michael couldn’t help but laugh. Tyler hadn’t been kidding. Rich really had used to read poetry. Oh, god, he had probably written poetry. Somewhere out there was a collection of Rich’s thirteen year old poetry.

But Michael was the only one who got the joke. Wilson looked unexpectedly extremely pissed off, and Jeremy wasn’t much better.

“The only thing you’re going to be fucking is your right hand,” Wilson spat, “you’re just jealous of Michael because someone out there actually likes him!”

It was the wrong thing to say. Wilson couldn’t have known how much of it had been the wrong thing to say, just as even Michael hadn’t understood. A lot made sense now.

It was so horrible to say that Rich had actually fallen back, smile wiped clean and eyes widened with shock. On some level Wilson had to have understood how much he had actually hit on the truth because he stepped back too, and Michael saw the strange pulse of a connection between them.

So it was Jeremy who was pissed off instead. He shoved Rich away, face turning red, and in a strange swap of roles he reached forward and grabbed Wilson’s collar.

Things had heated up too quickly, and Michael couldn’t stop his heart from leaping into this throat. Jeremy had barely hesitated.

“You better learn your place, you loser faggot,” Jeremy said. His hand was trembling. “You think that’s fucking funny, do you?” He shook him a little. “Do you?”

This was too much. Michael had to find his courage to move, to physically try and set himself between the livid Jeremy and the strangely unrepentant Wilson. Looked like someone else had found his courage too.

“Don’t take this out on him,” Michael said, finding the courage for his calm too. It never worked to get mad at Jeremy. He was probably used to that. “Come on, let’s just calm down.”

“Get out of my way, loser,” Jeremy hissed, and Michael found the pang of hurt in his heart and set it aside. It wasn’t helpful right now. “Michael, get out of my way!”

“Fun protip: I will not.” He carefully clasped a hand around Jeremy’s wrist and broke the hold, letting Wilson jump away. Strangely, Wilson didn’t look scared - he looked mad. Looked like he had more guts than Jeremy and Michael did. “Things are going to be okay. Whatever’s going on up there,” he reached out a hand and tapped Jeremy on the forehead, who was too surprised to recoil, “isn’t true. It’s okay.”

You could practically see the air go out of Jeremy, who stepped back and pressed his hand to his face, breathing deeply. Rich looked confused, as if he was still working out what Wilson had said.

The funny thing about mean people, Michael thought, was that they ruined more than the life of their victim. They ruined the lives of everyone around them too - their victim’s friends, their significant others, their families, and wherever Michael fit in for this. The mold got in and it just kept spreading, and you couldn’t ever make it stop, not really.

“Fucking pissant losers,” Jeremy muttered to himself, head in his hands. He lifted his head, teeth still set, and made a dismissive gesture towards the both of them. “Fuck off. Tell anybody about this and you’re dead.” When they hesitated, Wilson looking like he wanted to take a swing at him himself, Jeremy barked, “Go!”

They went, Michael and Wilson exchanging nervous glances, refusing to run.

Then they played Smash Bros. Michael apologized, Wilson had waved it off, but in the end Michael couldn’t help but think the guy was a little bit cool now. He had stood up to Rich. He had stood up to Jeremy! If Michael hadn’t already been in a relationship with Jeremy he would have never gotten the courage to do that.

When he told Wilson this he blushed bright red and looked pretty embarrassed. Still, it was a pretty cool thing to do. It was like he wasn’t even a loser at all.

It was nice to have a friend that he had no concerns about being a pod person. Sometimes imperfection was pretty damn cool.

  
  


**6069238454:** Michael look I’m so sorry I didn’t mean to blow up at you I would never hurt you.

 **6069238454:** But you know that what that dick said wasn’t true right you know Rich and I aren’t like that right we’re barely even friends

 **6069238454:** We’re just stuck in the same sinking ship together

 **6069238454** : So you aren’t mad, right?

 **6069238454:** It’s okay if you are

 **6069238454:** Seriously I’d get it

 **6069238454:** You have the right I’m really sorry I won’t do that again

 **6069238454:** Michael?

 **Michael Mell:** just apologize to Wilson later

 **6069238454:** Wait who’s Wilson

 **Michael Mell:** jesus christ

  
  


The day after Michael’s awkward confrontation with Jeremy and the slightly worrying burst of text messages, he had dropped in on the club meeting after school with Christine to check on Wilson only to find a familiar head of curly brown hair holding a handful of cards, looking extremely confused.

Christine, who was holding Michael’s hand with one hand and flipping through her script with the other, was so preoccupied Michael had to elbow her from where he had frozen in place. She looked up and squeaked.

“Aren’t you normally a robotics guy?” Yung was saying, bent over one of the tables where Tyler was at with the cards spread out in front of him, learning the rules. Tyler was nodding along bravely trying to mask his boredom. “Why the interest all of a sudden?”

Tyler just shrugged before he caught sight of Christine and Michael. He broke out into a wide smile and waved, and Michael waved weakly back. Christine smiled politely.

“Hey, guys! What’s up!” She reached up and patted Michael on the head. “I’m just here to drop this one off, then back to play rehearsal! What are we doing?”

Everyone in the room turned red and started mumbling. Despite the fact that Michael’s relationship was a lie he couldn’t help but feel smug.

Only Tyler looked relatively unaffected, his only sign of nervousness wiping his sweaty palms on his jeans. “Learning card games, apparently.” He brandished the cards. “I usually like something a little more high stakes, though.”

He was a natural. “I’ve been told I have a pretty good poker face,” Michael offered. “Christine and I have been looking at starting some role playing campaigns, though.”

“We already have one going on,” Christine said flatly.

They surreptitiously high fived. They had this undercover agent thing down pat.

Tyler, for his part, was clearly trying to bite down a laugh. “That’s awesome. I love D&D. Here, I think I have a copy of the newest 7x manual in my bag I can lend you.”

He shuffled something around in his bag. Michael heard some papers rustling, and Christine pointedly engaged the others in an impassioned rant on the health benefits of play rehearsal as a distraction. Only Wilson, sitting on top of a desk in the corner, looked thoughtful.

Surprisingly, Tyler pressed an actual D&D manual into his hands. It was the new cyberpunk themed one, the Blade Runner style one where robots had infiltrated the world and there were parallels to McCarthyism and stuff. In any other situation it would be mega cool that Michael was living the D&D intrepid adventure campaign but it turned out that in reality it kind of sucked.

He settled for smiling faintly at Tyler. “That’s so cool of you, dude. I’ll bring it back in perfect condition, trust me.”

They nodded firmly at each other. Everything they wanted to say couldn’t be said here, and Christine turned up her enthusiasm for play rehearsal up to eleven to hide the small exchange. The only one who paid attention was Wilson.

He didn’t have a lot of time. Michael found himself gripping the manual with white knuckles. His heart was beating double time, and not for the first time Michael decided that he was sick of the fear.

Michael nodded at Wilson before jerking his head towards the door, and Christine barely gave them a sideways glance as they entered the hallway. It was empty, blissfully quiet with the exodus of teenagers, and as Wilson leaned against the wall and Michael was left standing he couldn’t stop himself from opening the book.

“Were you the one who asked Heere to apologize?” Wilson asked flatly, arms crossed.

“That depends,” Michael said, equally flatly. “Did he actually do it?”

Wilson sighed, scrubbing his face with his hands. “Yeah. It was incredible, man. So silky smooth. By the time he left I was half-convinced that he was the sweetest guy ever and that I had committed him a grave injustice by going against his might. I was halfway down the hallway before I remembered that he had manhandled me and called me a faggot.”

Christ. Horribly, both of these things sounded like Jeremy. Michael flinched. “I think he was genuinely really sorry, if that helps. He’s just really into...image management.”

“Since when are you two friends?” Wilson asked incredulously. “I believe you about him being Satan himself now, dude. I’m sorry I fucking doubted you. So now you’re over your weird crush on him, dating a girl, and you’re friends with him? In less than a month?”

“It’s been a crazy month?”

“So in less than a month you’re friends with a guy who called you a loser,” Wilson said, “and tight with that freak of nature Rich.”

“I’m not friends with them -”

“Then why did he listen to you?” Wilson demanded. “You tell him to back off, he backs off. You tell him to apologize, and he apologizes. What kind of relationship do you two even have?”

Michael looked away, cheeks hot, wondering how ashamed he should be.

Finally, all Michael could manage to say was, “He’s not a bad guy. He just has - well, he has a lot of stuff. Brain stuff.”

How true that even was, Michael didn’t even know. That Jeremy heard voices, that the voices made him some kind of asshole...well, there were definitely other people who could say the same thing. Those people needed medication.

“What happened to you?” Wilson said, and Michael couldn’t help but wonder the same thing. “This isn’t you, Michael. You’ve been - I don’t know.” He faltered. “You’ve been different, is all. I guess you’re happier, but you’re sadder too.”

Michael looked down at his hands, then at the book in them.

Impulsivity could blow the whole thing wide open. Michael didn’t know what would happen if the whole thing was blown wide open, but he had the vague feeling that it would be bad and possibly involve some light brainwashing.

The idea of being brainwashed sounded scary. That was what had changed. Michael didn’t want to be brainwashed, obviously. Jeremy, Rich - that was what happened to you. They were miserable. What they had gotten back wasn’t worth it.

It was hard not to pity them. Sometimes he managed it, like with the stunt that Jeremy pulled the day before, but most of the time it was too obvious. Rich became hot air then, worthless and pointless.

Silently, Michael flipped the book open and leafed through it. Sure enough, three pictures were stuck in the back of the book. Michael couldn’t help but raise his eyebrows as he shook them into his hand, ignoring Wilson’s confused frown. He hadn’t seen an actual hard copy of a home photograph since he was a little kid.

He knew what the pictures held, so he showed them to Wilson.

It was two boys, a little younger than them, grinning widely and brandishing long ropes of Dave and Buster’s tickets. They were clutching twin embarrassing tie dye stuffed bears as they stood in front of a vending machine. Tyler looked pretty much the same, if smaller and more pimply, but Rich was a different universe.

His hair wasn’t dyed, for one. His normally diminutive height only emphasized his pathetically skinny frame and his equally pimply face. He wore glasses. His smile was big but real, and Michael realized with an electric jolt that he had never seen a genuine smile out of Rich. The one he wore in the photograph made him look...well, almost like a normal person. Maybe someone Michael could have been friends with.

Nah, it was Rich. But still.

Wilson was squinting at it, thoroughly confused, but Michael saw it on his face the minute the penny dropped. His expression rippled into horror, mixed with morbid fascination.

“Holy shit,” Wilson whispered, “this is blackmail.” He looked up at Michael sharply. “Are you collecting blackmail on Rich?”

Well, maybe. In a fashion. A little. Michael made a noncommittal sound, but that probably didn’t look very good either. “That’s not important. First off, you can’t tell anybody I ever showed you this picture. You’re right, I have changed. A lot’s happened in the past month. But people do change, Wilson.” Michael leaned forward and tapped the glossy picture, looking earnestly into Wilson’s eyes. “I think that one day Rich could change. He used to be...well, I don’t know if he was a good person or not, but I think he used to be a real person. Someone who liked to read, or to buy embarrassing arcade dolls with his best friend. Somebody imperfect, instead of perfectly...whatever Rich is. I know I’ve been running around doing weird crap, but you have to trust me. If I pull this off, I think this school’s going to be a better place.”

Wilson looked at him, then at the photograph, long and hard. After several moments deep in thought he finally cracked a smile. “I can never take him seriously ever again.”

“I know, right?”

Their mission done, and Christine actually desperate to get back to her beautiful play rehearsal where everything made sense and nothing hurt, they quickly said their goodbyes. The club barely called out a few hellos, back seat teaching an overwhelmed Tyler on how to play the game of the gods, and the only thing Michael dared to do before he and Christine pushed out the door was to grab onto a surprised Wilson’s wrist.

He leaned in, talking as quietly as he dared. “You noticed I’ve changed. You’re right, and I’m sorry. But because you noticed that, I need you to do me a favor.”

Wilson didn’t even hesitate. “Anything.”

“If I come to school one day different…” Michael paused a second and took a raspy breath, well aware that Christine was lingering by the edges of the conversation. “If I come to school hating you, or way more popular, or just too different to ignore...Wilson, if I ever become perfect…”

What? What could Wilson do?

“Save me,” Michael said lamely. “Save me or shoot me. Nobody deserves to live like that.”

Before Wilson could express his well deserved confusion Michael had pushed away, slinging his arm around Christine’s shoulders and walking with her to play rehearsal, where at least they admitted that they only pretended things made sense.

Two nights later he had shown up to Jeremy’s unannounced, and done nothing that night but assure him he wasn’t mad and play a lot of Mario Kart together. It was a little sad how much Jeremy had been relieved.

As Jeremy lay on his stomach on the bed, shoes pulled off and hair in disarray, tongue between his teeth as he grunted whenever he was hit with a koopa shell, Michael couldn’t help but wonder how much of Jeremy’s behavior was his fault.

He spent a lot of time being objectively awful. He spent a little time being wonderful. He was definitely dead inside, but not as dead inside as he liked to pretend. And Michael liked him. A lot. For whatever reason.

Michael was lying on the bed with him, but he paused the game so he could curl up and look at him.

They hadn’t been racing against each other, so it took Jeremy awhile to notice that he had stopped playing. He groaned as he finished second, waving his stylus in an ineffectual rage against God. “I’m so freaking out of practice!”

Michael hummed, out of things to say. Jeremy blinked over at him, cocking his head in his signature strangely bird-like way. “We okay?”

“Just like looking at you,” he said. “You can go back to playing.”

“That’s okay.” Jeremy put the game down, curling up so he could patch Michael in twin parenthesis. “What are you thinking about?”

“About how complicated things are,” Michael said honestly, “and how I wish they could be simple.” The bed was cold but warm, and the sterile bedroom had almost softened at the corners a little. The postcard was still tacked up on the cork board, but Michael had begun rebelliously leaving some of his stuff around too - cheap Superman knock off figurines he found at the dollar store, a dirty retro style toy robot. Jeremy had thought that was hilarious, for whatever reason, but he had also looked slightly creeped out. “What about you? What are you thinking about?”

“How boss I was being at Mario -”

“Honestly,” Michael said, sharper than he had meant to. “Honestly. What are you really thinking about?”

Left unsaid was the fact that it was something Michael had never known. Jeremy’s eye twitched, then his whole expression, then his head jerked a little to the side. Michael bit his bottom lip.

But Jeremy shook it off, and eventually sighed and curled a little more tightly in on himself. “I don’t know. How much of a loser I was for liking video games. How I shouldn’t even be hanging out with you like this. We haven’t even done anything today, there’s no point in me being here.” His voice turned bitter, and he clenched his fists. “How lucky I am to be here. How easily it can all be taken away.”

“By who?” Michael whispered. “Jeremy, I’m not going anywhere. You can stop trying to push me away. I’m not leaving you.”

They lay in silence, breathing.

Finally, Jeremy said, “That’s what I’m afraid of.”

They lay together the rest of the night, staying together and holding each other, as they were finally allowed to do.

In the dark Michael felt their twin breaths, and wondered if Jeremy was a good person.


	5. Chapter 5

  


The next day found The Resistance crowded in the back room of a 7/11, with a grimy whiteboard hung up on the wall and three grim teenagers crowded around a desk strewn with papers.

Christine herself was standing next to the whiteboard, dual wielding five scratch and sniff white board markers to make a beautifully arranged plan of attack with helpful arrows, time schedules, and color coded agendas for each person. Dana was pouring over the yearbook photographs and Michael’s transcriptions of his conversations with Rich and some paraphrased conversations with Jeremy. Michael was trying to figure out his love life.

Finally Dana was forced to sit back in her chair, running her fingers through her coarse dyed black hair. “You two have really dug yourself into some deep shit.”

“I know,” Christine said glumly, underlining the title of the agenda— WHAT TO EXPECT WHEN YOU’RE EXPECTING (A CONSPIRACY)— before capping her pen. “Why is doing the right thing so hard?”

“Please, honey, you were perfect throughout this whole thing. You did nothing wrong.” Dana pointed at a miserable Michael. “Mike here is the one who slept with the enemy.”

“I thought he was your garden variety douchebag,” Michael protested, “not an unwitting pawn of the Illuminati!”

Dana rolled her eyes as Christine thoughtfully added ‘The Illuminati’ onto their list of suspects, which was depressingly short and weird. “What made you think sleeping with a douchebag was a good idea at all?”

Michael planted his face on the desk, ignoring how gross and sticky it was as his forehead pressed against the cool formica. “It’s a long story.”

“Isn’t everything.”

“Accepting the reality of our situation isn’t productive, guys!” Christine clapped her hands, propping her hands on her hips and glaring at the others until they unenthusiastically turned to behold her and her whiteboard. “Let’s go over the facts.”

The facts were these:

Well, they didn’t know the facts. They had suppositions, ideas, fears, and a gut sense. They didn’t exactly have any proof either. They had a photocopied yearbook, several testimonials, and vague hints from two of the suspects. At this point it probably would have been helpful to list the plan of attack, except for the fact that they had none.

It seemed like all they had was a grouchy cashier, a psychopathic double agent, a fake relationship, and a 7/11 home base.

It would have to be enough.

“I know I’m biased,” Michael admitted, “but I think Jeremy’s the key to this.”

The unimpressed looks from the other two told him that they did, indeed, think that he was biased.

Michael leapt up, shifting himself over so he could point to the whiteboard too. He pointed to one of the two large columns Christine had set up, based on their two best sources of information: Jeremy and Rich. Both of their columns had been split into two: ‘Evil’ and ‘Slightly More Morally Ambiguous’. Which boded well for Michael— he had been sleeping with the morally ambiguous, not the evil!

“Look, we know Jeremy’s the common link between the two schools. Ground Zero,” He pointed to a small picture of a mushroom cloud, “and our school,” he pointed to a cute diagram of their school and their school mascot. “He hooked up with the base of evil that was already here,” he pointed to Rich’s column, where they had drawn an angry stick figure above it. It was a very short stick figure. “And took over the school. What if Jeremy transferred here for a reason? To push some kind of agenda?”

They looked around at each other uneasily.

“I think the key question here,” Dana said slowly, “is if there’s someone in control here. Like the Emperor from Star Wars. Then it’s one malevolent entity...and I feel so stupid saying this...that’s using these brainwashed kids as puppets.”

“Or it could be its own sentient organism,” Christine pointed out, “like a virus that seeks to propagate. That would make Jeremy and Rich patient zero for our school, and the virus is planning to spread from them.” She shivered. “Like in Alien.”

“Under no circumstances is it like Alien!” Michael said sharply. “Way too many phallic metaphors!”

“You’re sleeping together!”

Michael barreled over Dana. “Look, what about the school itself? We should infiltrate. Sneak into the school, see if we can find the giant plant that sent out these spores or whatever.”

But Dana just looked away, lips thin.

The other two faltered. Dana wasn’t really in the business of looking afraid, no matter how bad the situation had gotten.

“I had a contact at the school,” she said slowly. “A middle schooler little sister of one of the infected people. She was going to hang around her sister’s school and try and see what she could find out.”

A middle schooler. If they had gotten a kid into trouble Michael didn’t know what he would do.

“Did they take her?” Christine asked, frightened “Dana?”

“She got back to me a couple of times.” Dana looked down at the table, scratching her fingernail at some stickiness. “Nothing yet, everything normal. Everyone’s a little creepy but they’re fine.” She fell silent for a few seconds, shaking her head. Finally, she said thickly, “I wish I had told her how dangerous the mission was.”

Fuck. If that wasn’t a depressing sentence. “Did they take her?” Michael asked.

“Are we busted?” Christine’s eyes were wide.

Dana shook her head. “No, I don’t think so. Unlike Michael here I don’t actually tell anybody anything that’s going on. A few days after her second report she texted me saying that the school was fine, everything was fine, that they had just implemented some new...workshop program for success or whatever.” Dana snorted. “An after school program to help kids be their best selves. I pretended to buy it, sold her some bullshit on how I was just worried about bullying problems. She was brainwashed but she’s also twelve. I think we’re safe. Nothing’s happened to us yet.” She took in a deep breath. “Last time I checked she won her middle school’s spelling bee.”

So their revolution had already had a casualty. Michael sent up a silent prayer for forgiveness to the poor girl. They could still help her. They would have to.

“The thing is I don’t think it’s spread that far,” Christine said. She turned to Michael. “These pod people always make a big splash at their schools, right? How many people do we really know who are as...extreme as Jeremy and Rich? If the poor middle schooler was infected, then it was probably her big sister that did it. If it’s that easy, why isn’t every little sibling infected?”

They just didn’t know.

Dana was still looking down at the table. “Michael,” she said eventually, “what’s Jeremy’s line on where he transferred from and why?”

Michael stared at her before pulling out his phone.

 **Michael Mell:** it was really nice spending time with you last night

 **Michael Mell:** where have u been all my life

 **Michael Mell:** ….i mean that literally where did you even go before you transferred why would you ditch your old school for our crummy one.

As if it was a hot potato Michael threw his phone onto the center of the table. All three teenagers stared at it anxiously.

For better or for worse, he responded immediately. Michael snatched it back up just as fast as the girls leaned forward.

Michael read the text out loud.

 **6069238454:** Haha, I’m from Middlebury. Go Ants! ;)

 **6069238454:** Your school isn’t so crummy! It has you!!

“Well,” Michael said, “that answered what we already know.”

 **Michael Mell:** did u set the gym on fire

 **6069238454:** Yeah, I was so smoking hot at our homecoming dance.

“Ugh!”

“Is he always this evasive?” Dana asked, “Because if he is then you should have guessed brainwashed zombie earlier.”

Michael clutched his phone to his chest, hissing. “Jeremy is not a zombie!”

Dana crossed her arms, unimpressed. “Yeah? Prove he’s not.”

 **Michael Mell:** my friend wants to know if you’re a zombie

“Christ, not like that!”

 **6069238454:** Well, you can’t prove I’m not.

Christine threw up her hands. “We’re doomed!”

 **6069238454:** Wait, you have other friends?

 **Michael Mell:** RUDE

“I honestly don’t know why we expected a helpful answer out of the zombie!” Dana smacked the table and pointed to the whiteboard, standing up from her chair. “Face it, he and your weirdo friend Rich know everything! We’re sitting here trying to put together this puzzle when we have a quarter of the pieces, we don’t know what the puzzle looks like, the light’s out and they’re all middle pieces!” She smacked a fist into her palm, the intimidation factor only heightened by her convenience store uniform. “I say we corner one of them and make them talk!”

“Please don’t beat up my douchey FWB,” Michael said weakly.

“They probably have cyanide pills,” Christine added grimly. “You know zombies. They’d never reveal the secrets of their masters.”

“Jeremy’s not a zombie!”

“So we trick them,” Dana said. “Get them to talk and spill everything without censorship or lying. But they can’t know why we’re asking and we’re probably better off if they can’t remember why we were asking at all.”

“How would we even do that?” Christine asked miserably.

They all stood in silence around the table, contemplating the hopelessness of the situation.

Then something occurred to Michael.

He slammed his hand on the table, sending the papers and pencils rattling, both out of excitement and of a natural sense for melodrama. “Alcohol!”

The excitement was cut short when a hand rapped the fake wood counter on the reception desk, several hard and fast knocks that didn’t let up. “Hello! Can I get some service in here? Jesus, this is what we get for not going to Target.”

The shrill and inherently unlikable voice was disturbingly familiar. It was the familiar rush of exasperation and minor hate that tipped Michael off, and when Christine positively squeaked he knew that she had caught on too.

Michael reached for a vest that Dana had set aside over a chair, quickly shucking his own jacket in favor of putting the vest on. Both the girls looked incredulous, but the voice rapped on the counter again they realized that they had other problems.

“Why are you stealing my job?” Dana hissed, as quietly as possible. “Just hide in the break room, nobody has to know!”

“No, I have an idea.” Michael took a deep breath and schooled his expression into something bored and annoying and nowhere near panic. “Bear with me on this one.”

Then he slipped out of the breakroom, glaring daggers at Chloe Valentine and Brooke Lohst.

It was definitely a surprise to see them there. They were too good for 7/11s, their bodies pure and undefiled by GMOs and Twinkies. They both gaped when they saw him there, and Michael couldn’t help but relish his unexpected and unwelcome surprise presences in both of their lives. Turnabout was fair play.

“Can I help you?” Michael said, as bored as physically possible. He was no Christine, but he had picked up a few tricks.

For their part, Chloe’s fancy tan bag with a lot of clasps was slung over her shoulder, credit card at the ready. Her skinny black jeans and draping dark red blouse cut an impressive figure against her high heels and long, flowing brown hair. Brooke was standing a little behind her, cuddled up in her giant sweater and chewing gum with a wide eyed stare.

“Michael?” Chloe said, thankfully with no more disdain in her voice than usual. “Since when do you work in a convenience store?”

“Uh, since today? I’m just filling in for a friend.” The girls had to stop and parse that, and he saw the physical ‘sounds fake but okay’ sentiments drift over their faces. Michael wondered when they were going to find out that he was a compulsive liar. “So are you going to buy something or what?”

As usual, Brooke was the first one to move on with her life. She shrugged and meandered towards the magazines, picking up the Cosmo with a wide eyed stare and holding it like a dead rat. As usual, Chloe hadn’t yet gotten over herself, and she looked around furtively before leaning over the counter, her caked on dark mascara accenting her cutting stare. “You’re up to something, Mell,” she hissed, “and when I find out what it is you’re going to be in so much trouble.”

Michael couldn’t help but bark a laugh, and Chloe stepped back in surprise. She had literally no idea. “I got better things to do with my life than worry about you, Valentine. It’s pretty rude to accost employees, you know.”

It was beginning to look like Chloe was a little slow on the uptake when it came to anything that challenged her worldview of a perfect world where everything revolved around her. Michael didn’t know if the fact that Jeremy was the exact same way was hilarious or sad. It said a lot about Michael, that’s for sure. “I seriously don’t know what your deal even is, Mell,” Chloe complained, crossing her arms. “How did you even get Christine to like you? You’re a nobody.”

Did any of these people fully comprehend how completely rude they were to him at all times? Was he not a human being to them, or were they just above humanity? “If Christine’s actually your friend,” Michael said tightly, “then you’d know that she doesn’t care about whether somebody’s a nobody or not. We met, we bonded, she asked me out, now we’re going out. Now we’re dating and hanging out with our friends in the back room of a 7/11.” Michael jerked his thumb backwards. “She’s engrossed in a game of Texas Hold ‘Em with a friend of ours but I can say hi to her for you if you want.”

“Oh.” Chloe hesitated, checking over her shoulder for Brooke. She was lingering mournfully over the beer freezer on the other side of the convenience store, pressing her little forehead against the frosted glass. “So she liked even after she knew that you were bisexual? That it didn’t make you slutty or gay or anything, right?”

Jesus christ. “You know, if the only reason you’re acting like a dick to me is that I’m gay I’d appreciate it if you didn’t pretend it was about social status or who I am as a person or wanting Christine to have a nice boyfriend,” Michael said sharply. Chloe looked away, chewing her lip. “Get over your superiority complex. You’re either a bigot or you’re not, but either way I don’t have the time to stand here and deal with the shit you and your little friends keep heaping on me. Buy something or get out of my store.”

With a quick click and turn of her heel Chloe strode away, torn in indecision and something that could have almost been embarrassment if it wasn’t for the fact that it was Chloe. He was just glad she hadn’t realized that it wasn’t his store and that he had no power to kick her out.

Despite her confident stride she clearly had no idea where the thing she was looking for was, and her bending ignobly over the cleaning supplies aisle was deeply hilarious. Brooke was now sadly staring at the ice cream, regretting that her life had turned out this way.

The door to the break room cracked open, and Dana poked her head out from inside. “What are you doing?” Dana asked, furious. “Stop it with the sketchy shit!”

“I know exactly what I’m doing,” Michael said, blatantly lying. “Just trust me,” he said, not being trustworthy at all.

Dana rolled her eyes and retreated.

When Chloe finally casually walked to the counter, clutching a bag of corn nuts in one hand and a pack of Taquis in the other, Michael pasted on his best ‘Customer Service But Better Than You’ face.

She slid the junk food over the counter and waiting for Michael to somehow ring them up in a way that was probably completely wrong, crossing her arms and tapping her leopard print heel on the ground. She kept an eye out for Brooke, who was now idly spinning the $1 DVD stand.

When Michael made to slide the Taquis over her she held out a hand, shaking her head. “Those are yours. As a, uh…” she trailed off. “Yep.”

“If you want to apologize you have to say it.” Michael tried not to betray his surprise that she was apologizing at all.

“Fine. Sorry and all that.” She bit her lip and looked around the convenience store, pretending it was deeply interesting instead of just dirty and, you know, a convenience store. She spun a ring around and around with one finger, looking around almost aggressively. “Look, uh.” She leaned forward, keeping her voice down and staring anxiously at Brooke. “Christine wouldn’t really mind dating a bi person at all, then? How many straight people are okay with dating bi people? Or even maybe gay people. In your estimate, I mean. The bi person does not include you.”

Michael stared at her.

Chloe’s gaze flickered to Brooke again.

Ah.

Sometimes it felt like the world was growing more and more complicated by the day. Conspiracies, sci-fi style entities trying to take over the world, dating. People got more complicated and developed so many layers, so that the bad guys acted good sometimes and the good guys may have been bad all along. When you’re a teenager everybody’s a little bit inscrutable and not a lot of anything’s in the habit of making sense.

But sometimes the world simplified itself a bit. Learning more about somebody didn’t always make them more complicated— sometimes it made them people. Once they were people you could be friends, and being friends with somebody was the easiest thing in the world. All you had to do was care about them.

Chloe wasn’t a pod person. Chloe was, for better or for worse, stumbling her way through life like everyone else.

A familiar taste lingered on the back of Michael’s tongue, almost like gross black licorice. But it was a little sweet too.

There was a lot of things to say, so Michael chose the easiest one.

“Do you want a slushie?”

Chloe stared at him, caught off balance and slightly annoyed. “Child, I was being serious.”

Michael shrugged, grabbing a cup from the stand and going to the far back end of the counter. The metal behemoth of the slushie machine, clear plastic tub reverberating with the smooth hum, and the slow churning of the slushie production characterized the holy altar of the sugar syrup. Michael grabbed a medium sized cup and tapped the machine with it. “So am I. What flavor?”

“I don’t want your gross sugar—”

He poured her the Strawberry Fanta one, making it generous.

When he jammed the cap on and stuck a straw in it Chloe was practically hiding behind her bag. Michael reached over the counter and unceremoniously shoved it into her hands. “It’s on the house.”

“If you’re trying to bribe me I prefer Chanel.” Chloe poked her straw uncertainty through the drink, shifting the ice. “What’s your damage?”

There were really so many other things he could be doing right now. But Michael chose to lean against the counter instead, propping his hip on it and crossing his arms. “Chloe, let’s get one thing straight. We aren’t friends.”

“Oh, even after you got me this nice iced diabetes?”

Michael sighed, taking a deep breath. Patience. “Do you want to know how old I was when I found out I was gay?”

Chloe stared at him some more. “No.”

“I didn’t,” Michael said flatly. “When I was seven I decided I was going to marry Jaden Smith. My mother thought it was hilarious and helped me print out pictures of him and put it on my wall. My father was pretty upset about it, mostly because he thought Jaden Smith was an airhead and that I needed better role models.” He still had the pictures in a shoebox underneath his bed somewhere. Maybe Jeremy would get a kick out of them. Then again, maybe not. “Their opinions are the only two I’ve ever cared about. The entire fucking school can give me endless shit but I can’t hate myself over it, because the two people who taught me what it meant to be gay taught me that the most embarrassing thing about it was my horrible taste.”

“I don’t know what this has to do with me,” Chloe said, poking her straw through her drink again and again like a woodpecker.

“It has everything to do with you,” Michael said, exasperated. “I can’t play gay best friend here because I’m not your friend. But that’s why you can trust me. I don’t want anything from you and I don’t care about your opinion. Look me in the eyes and tell me you aren’t bisexual, Chloe.”

He waited for her to look him in the eyes and say that she wasn’t, that he had made a gross miscalculation. He waited for her to get mad at him or to deny it or to just do anything bitchy. But she sucked up her slushie and looked away.

She grunted, holding a hand to her head. “Ow! Brain Freeze.”

“Did it cure you?” Michael asked dryly.

“Fuck off.” She took a long, rattling sigh and crossed her arms, tapping her slushie against her arm. When she spoke it was to the ceiling. “What are you going to do, judge me?”

Michael couldn’t help but smile. “Denial is just so 2019.”

“I can and will hurt you.” She tapped her cup against her arm in a staccato rhythm. “It doesn’t matter. Everyone’s a little bit, right? Kinsey scale shit? I date guys.”

“Uh huh.”

“If you tell anybody you’re fucking dead.”

“I’m getting a little bit tired of hearing that.”

“Wait, what?” Her eyes sharpened and she leaned in. “Michael, who else told you that?”

“You mean who else do I know that’s closeted?” Michael asked, suddenly tired. “I can’t tell you that. I can tell you that it’s a waste of your valuable time.”

She stiffened, sucking angrily at her slushie. For someone who was too good for convenience store food she sure was enjoying it. She glanced at Brooke again, who was playing on her phone. “You don’t get it,” Chloe hissed to him, glaring. “You can throw your social life down the toilet all you want but I actually have a life.”

“Which would be ruined by you admitting something to yourself.”

“Yes! Goddammit, yes!” She bit her lip, hard, and Michael couldn’t help but feel sorry for her. “Christine would— and maybe Jake— but you know Jeremy and Rich! Rich would eat me alive but Jeremy would never talk to me again! He’d make my life miserable.” Chloe looked down at the counter, miserable by her own design. “You don’t know Jeremy, Michael. He pretends and he plays and he’s just the nicest guy, but deep inside he’s just like the rest of us. He doesn’t like you at all, and I think it’s pretty fucking obvious why.”

Maybe not that obvious. Michael hummed, leaning against the counter. “Didn’t know Chloe Valentine let other people tell her what to do.”

She glared at him. “You know what I mean, asshole.”

“Really? Because I don’t see the point in being Queen Bee or whatever if you let other people push you around. Are you seriously telling me Jeremy and Rich are more important than you?” Michael raised an eyebrow as Chloe shifted uncomfortably. She had internalized the lesson that Jeremy was greater but hadn’t admitted it to herself. “You know, I could always tell that all of Jeremy’s friends were scared of him.”

She gaped at him, fake pink nails digging into the plastic cup. “You’re so full of bullshit.”

“The entire school’s afraid of him,” Michael said flatly. “In a way that they never were of you. You’re a bitch, Chloe. Jeremy’s a monster.” In more ways than she knew. “You’re letting a psychopath, a monster, and a school full of sheep tell you how to love. It’s pathetic.”

“You don’t understand!” Chloe snapped, louder than she had meant to. But Brooke hadn’t turned around, even as Michael kind of wished she would. “Bully for you, you have two parents who just fell over you and went to all of your ballet classes. Newsflash, Mell. I made something of myself. I’ve accomplished something. I’m important, I’m cool, and people like— like you, and gay people like you, aren’t worth anything. I don’t feel like throwing all of that away just because Brooke’s hot!”

She clicked her jaw shut, eyes widening.

“There’s no such thing a someone who’s not worth loving, Chloe.” Michael thought of Jeremy. Even a monster like him could be worth it. If Jeremy could, Chloe could. There was no way to tell her that now. “People don’t have worth like that. Lives do. I don’t think a life has any worth at all if you let people tell you how to love.” He pointed at her. “You’re Chloe Valentine and you don’t give a shit about anyone’s opinion of you. You’re better than they are, your heels are more expensive, and your makeup is flawless today. You’re queer and you’re still better than they are. You make being queer cool. You’re queer? It’s cool now.”

He couldn’t possibly know how Chloe was feeling. He had never been her, thank god. He had never been in the same universe as her. Whatever it looked like, whoever lived there, Michael couldn’t possibly understand.

So when she broke out into a large smile and tossed her hair, sucking at her slushie, he could only hope that she had some great realization about herself instead of just accepting her sexuality out of pettiness.

“That bitch Yolanda is going to be so mad,” Chloe said gleefully. “I’m going to make something trendy that she couldn’t possibly steal.”

“It’s a limited resource,” Michael encouraged, “make it like a birthright caste system.”

“Gay people have all the best clothing,” Chloe said, almost to herself this time. “Everyone knows lesbians are a year ahead on all the best fashion trends.”

“That’s the shallow spirit.”

“All of my favorite Instagram models are lesbians!”

“Doesn’t that say something about you?”

But she was growing excited now, warming to the idea of still being better than everyone else in a novel and exclusive way, and it was probably the best Michael was going to get. “Then I could create matching outfits for me and Brooke— I mean me and whoever I start dating, and I could write really artsy poetry about it. I can talk about my oppression! Finally!”

Michael raised his hand. “Wait, I thought the point was not to be oppressed.”

Chloe made a dismissive noise, gesturing with her slushie in excitement. “Well, I’m not going to be personally oppressed. I oppress other people, Michael. It’s, like, my job. But now if I say that I’m oppressed I can oppress people even better!” She grinned. “I have a card now. I’ve always wanted a card!”

Jesus, he’s created a monster.

But it was strangely bolstering too. Maybe their school was due for a change. Once he got Brooke out of the closet too— because there was no way that girl was straight either— maybe their school would make a turn around. Once they saved Jeremy and Rich the school would never be the same. Then the only straight person in the popular group would be Jake!

“Will you remember me when being gay is cool?” Michael asked weakly. “I didn’t know the conversation would end up this way but I want to take credit.”

She rolled her eyes. “Ugh, fine.” She mimicked sprinkling pixie dust all over Michael, who obligingly struck a flamboyant pose. “You aren’t one hundred percent awful. You’re actually…” she looked down at the floor, playing with her straw. “Thanks. It’s weird, but I know you weren’t trying to suck up. You’d be horrible at it, I’d notice. Were you actually, like, trying to help me?”

“To be honest, I came out here to see if I could convince you to convince Jake to throw a house party that I can crash to push my own obscure agenda, but I couldn’t just break gay code and leave you to be sad and gay by yourself.”

“Gay code?”

Michael shrugged. “Stick together, I guess? I don’t think we do that enough.”

Chloe looked thoughtful. “Huh.” She leaned in, sliding the slushie cup back over the counter. “Convince me about this house party thing.”

“I can sell you beer.”

“Sold.” She slapped the counter, snatching her corn nuts. She pitched her voice up. “Brooke, honey! We’re wasting daylight!”

“Okay!” She bounced over, latching onto Chloe’s arm. “Did you get my corn nuts?”

“Duh.” It was almost cute, the way Chloe was so self-conscious about the weirdly tactile nature of girl besties. “Go get the car started, I need to threaten Mell.”

“Okay!” Brooke popped open the bag and promptly began stuffing some in her mouth. “Hey, is that a slushie? I love slushies.”

“I’ll bring one out to the car for you,” Chloe said swiftly, rearranging her hair. “Blue, right?

“Duh.” Wasn’t really hip on the vocabulary, that one. But Chloe and Michael patiently waited for the bell to ring as Brooke stepped out into the twilight.

It was night, now. Twilight was beginning to descend and the sunlight was bleeding into the blue tint. The days were beginning to stretch longer now, and for the first time in his life Michael was wondering what tomorrow would bring. He no longer knew.

Michael silently poured another slushie for Brooke, this time piled high with blue. He passed it to Chloe instead of sliding it, and Chloe’s face crumpled when she looked at it.

“I should give it up. She’s so obviously straight.”

“Oh my god.” Michael massaged his brow. “Look, perfect plan. You make Jake hold the party, we’ll supply the booze, then we can get Brooke super drunk and see if she makes out with you.”

“Please,” Chloe said reflexively, “Brooke always tries to make out with me when we’re drunk.”

Michael gave her an unimpressed look.

“Straight girls do that all the time!”

“Is that what Brooke says when you try to make out with her when you’re drunk?”

Chloe’s world had been rocked too many times that afternoon. She defensively flipped her hair, shaking off the niggling homoerotic questions. “Whatever. She’s straight, you’ll see. What do you want in return, Mell?”

“Oh, nothing.” Michael shrugged easily, back to his compulsive lying. “Just get me and Christine invited to the party.”

Her eyes narrowed. “This is a very exclusive party, Mell. I could pull off Christine, but even as her date you’re toast.”

He pointed silently to the beer freezer. Then he pointed outside where Brooke was waiting in the car.

“Jesus, fine.” She sighed. “I can’t believe I have to make you socially acceptable now. This is going to take, like, so much work.”

“Nobody’s twisting your arm,” Michael drawled. “There’s one other thing, but I’ll have to cash it in later.”

“Just what I need, a favor for Michael Mell.” Chloe rolled her eyes. “Oh, how the mighty have fallen.”

“It’s nothing big.” That, of course, was the lie. It was bigger than she understood. It might have been bigger than Michael understood. “Just believe me when the time comes, is all.”

“Yeah?” Chloe asked, raising a perfectly manicured eyebrow. “Believe you about what?”

“You’ll know it when you see it.”

“That’s ominous.”

He pointed to the slushie. “And that’s melting. Get out of my store.”

Long after Chloe left he and Christine were left sitting on the same counter, Dana closing up behind them. He and Christine had broken open a pack of Peanut M&Ms, crunching them in the silent store as the air conditioner hummed and the slushie machine churned in its never ending toil.

Once the popular girls had left it had begun feeling too quiet, and the enthusiasm for the meeting had quickly passed. Michael had pulled a plan out of his ass, manipulated Chloe through heartfelt sympathy, and accidentally made her accept her sexuality through sheer spite. Michael could appreciate that. He had been doing a lot of things out of pure spite lately.

They huddled together, the picture of teenagers loitering at a late night convenience store. Outside on the avenue cars were racing by, roaring with luminescent headlight eyes, and the eerie glow of the neon signs lit the streets up until it hardly felt like night anymore. But they felt it, how they were going to have to go to bed soon and get up and do this mess all over again. Some plans could only be made in the night, and some desperate ideas could only be carried out when you knew on some level day would never come.

“We get Rich drunk,” Christine said finally, staring at the glass convenience store window into the dusky parking lot. “Then he talks.”

“There’s a million ways this can go wrong,” Dana said. She rubbed a thumb on the counter in glum circles. “If he’s actually on our side then wouldn’t he have told us all he could?”

“He’s fighting the brainwashing,” Michael said darkly. “It’s almost as if he’s trying to slip stuff past it. Maybe if we get him drunk then the lack of inhibition applies to the brainwashing too.”

Christine crunched an M&M. “If we can free him, maybe we can free the others.”

They looked at each other uneasily.

“This isn’t our best idea,” Dana said.

“You know it’s still possible that we’re grossly over exaggerating how sometimes teenagers hit puberty and become more attractive and successful,” Michel pointed out. “For fuck’s sake, guys, my douchey friend with benefits could just have schizophrenia. He could just be, you know, a douche. We’re running around saying evil aliens or giant plants or government brainwashing are the reason why popular kids are popular. We’re lunatics. I would literally rather believe that an evil sentient virus made Jeremy homophobic than just believe he’s an asshole. Or mentally ill. Or an asshole.”

“Rich’s hints do sound pretty obscure,” Dana admitted. “Why is our greatest source of intel a crazy person?”

They fell silent.

“It’s too late to back out now,” Christine said quietly. “We’re in too deep.”

“One way or another,” Michael said, “we’re going to find out soon.”

And to think other kids got nervous about going to a cool kid high school party. They did not know the meaning of the word fear. Michael had bigger problems. Granted, the problems were still if the popular kids were going to ruin his life, but still.

Christine reached out and took his hand and gave it a tight squeeze, meeting his eyes in her trademark intense passion. “I’m going to need party clothes.”

  


If anybody had told Michael last semester that he was going to be clothes shopping with Chloe Valentine, Brooke Lohst, and Christine Canigula, he would have asked for a little of what they were smoking. It was clearly better than Michael’s shit, which mostly lately had just made him a little paranoid. More than usual.

It had actually been a little fun. Chloe had been watching too many of those ‘Complete Transformation!’ YouTube videos, and for some reason she assumed that he would have no problem with makeup. Michael had a million problems with makeup and felt uncomfortable with changing literally anything about himself at this point, so Christine had to beat them off with a stick. Best fake girlfriend.

But apparently Michael would permanently embarrass Christine if he showed up to the party looking like his normal gamer and stoner self, which would somehow translate into eternal shame on Chloe’s lineage. Which was how he ended up in a shopping mall with real life girls.

Chloe, for her part, had actually seemed delighted to meet someone who gave as little fucks as Michael did about being cool. She was a great person to verbally spar with, and the constant low level animosity was somehow comforting. Brooke had been confused about the sudden turn around, but Michael had always known that she hadn’t been as antagonistic as she half-heartedly tried to pretend. She adapted to the new situation with her usual nonchalance.

They were waiting on a bench in front of the women’s changing room, Brooke yawning with her usual sleepiness as Michael rattled a leg. He could already tell how fun this party was going to be, if by fun you meant tremendously stressful.

“So,” Brooke said awkwardly, running her fingers through her hair. “You’re, like, kosher now, right?”

“Jeremy’s the Jewish one, but sure,” Michael drawled, sticking his hands in his pockets.

Sure enough, Brooke winced a little when he said Jeremy’s name. “He’ll come around. He just doesn’t know you too well yet. I mean, he was working really hard at that. You’ve been hanging out more, right?”

They had, a little. Jeremy had finally come around to the idea of talking to him in public, for reasons Michael really hoped had nothing to do with the fact that it was frankly growing suspicious how he refused to acknowledge him. He was perfectly cordial and earnest in public, but everyone else had caught the undercurrents of tension and anxiety between them. They had jumped to a very well founded conclusion, one that Michael wished could have been just a little more wrong.

But sometimes when the table cleared out or when the class had begun to pick up Jeremy stood next to him and smiled, bouncing a little on the balls of his feet or surreptitiously checking him out. Maybe one day. Maybe that day would be soon.

Then Chloe paused. “Wait, Jeremy’s Jewish?”

The air went out of Michael and was replaced by supreme exhaustion. He leaned back on the bench, propping the back of his head against the wall. “How pathetic,” he muttered to himself. “Even that’s too much for him. What a vain airhead.”

Brooke’s mouth fell open in a perfect o before she turned away, flipping her hair. “I never heard anything. I’m a gossip, not a tattletale.” But she looked down at her fingers, and she let the perfect hair fall into a curtain over her face. “You’re a nerd, right? If I tell you something, will you keep it a secret? Nerds have codes of honor or something, I saw it on TV.” She hesitated. “Even from my friends and the people who kind of tolerate you. You can’t tell Rich and Jeremy.”

“Gay nerds are expert detectives.” Michael grinned slightly at her, and tapped his nose. “I won’t tell anyone about you. There’s a gay code of honor too. We’re a cabal.”

“Tell anyone about what?” Brooke asked innocently.

Michael could only grin broadly. “Try getting Chloe drunk and see if you can make out with her at the party. It’s a pretty great way to tell out if someone wants to bone.”

Brooke squeaked and turned bright red. “I— I don’t! Chloe? What? Chloe’s perfect and amazing and literally flawless, who wouldn’t want to be with her— shit!”

Michael laughed, long and loud. “Think of it this way— you have an oppression card now.”

Horribly enough, she looked contemplative. “It’s definitely something that bitch Yolanda can’t steal.” Then she hesitated and looked at Michael out of the corner of her eye. She smiled. “So you play Zelda, right? Isn’t Link hot?”

“Holy shit.”

They even got fro-yo afterwards. Michael wondered how his life had ever gotten to this point. The fro-yo was weirder than the pod people.

At least there were two more people who were safe. Brooke and Chloe still enjoyed slushies, still gushed over each other’s clothes, were still afraid of Rich and Jeremy. Sometimes Michael was sure that the only people who weren’t afraid of Rich and Jeremy were each other.

He eyed Chloe as she fixed her hair whenever she saw Brooke, and how Brooke smacked desperately at her gum whenever Chloe’s hair started glistening in the sun, and he thought that maybe two more people could join the rebellion. Their information networks could be killer, and they could probably use a decisive, bitchy leader like Chloe in their group. She would murder the pod people king with her shoe.

The party was Saturday, and Michael was left to anxiously consider every possible way their plan could go wrong. It turns out that a plan as dumb as ‘get Rich drunk’ could go wrong a million ways and in the depths of night between three and four am Michael was stuck lying in bed, staring at his ceiling and wondering what it would be like to be brainwashed. What it would be like to like it.

He couldn’t even smoke weed to help with the anxiety anymore because it made him even more paranoid. Dammit!

Christine was desperately trying to keep up with play rehearsal despite her own mounting anxiety over the topic. She was shockingly good at hiding it, so good that Michael was beginning to see where her acting skills came from, but her social skills were the first to go when she was anxious and she was having increasing difficulties reading people’s faces or finding out how to join conversations. Her inside voice was also going, which was hilarious, but even as Michael did the best he could hanging around with her all the time there was only so much. They were all being worn thin.

When the bell to end lunch rang in the middle of an impassioned conversation on Thursday about blocking she was so startled she burst into tears. Her friends ran to console her but Michael settled for gently taking her hand and settling them both into the large costume closet, where they sat cushioned by seventeenth century French ball gowns and Victorian waistcoats. Christine had drawn her legs up to her chest, sniffling. She mumbled an apology.

“Hey, none of that,” Michael said, gently but firmly. “I may be your fake boyfriend but I do not fake care about you.”

Christine wrapped herself in plastic taffeta, miserable with a splotchy red face. “I thought it was the Asperger’s when I saw something wrong.”

The quick turnaround threw Michael for a loop, but he supposed in a way that they had never stopped talking about it. “What did you notice?”

“Oh, you know how it is. Nothing that couldn’t be explained.” She twirled a lock of coarse black hair around her finger, eyes distant. “It’s really hard for me to do dumb stuff like read people’s faces or catch sarcasm. I’m really good at it nowadays, but when I was little nobody liked me because I was too much. Too loud, too jumpy, too everything. But I think I’m pretty good at people. If you have to focus so much on just talking with them, you start picking up everything.”

Michael was silent.

“Jeremy’s my friend. He’s my really good friend. Sometimes it doesn’t feel like it because I keep talking about him behind his back, but it’s true. I liked how nice he was and how he was always really patient with me and how excited he would get about play rehearsal just because I was. I liked him because he was really easy to understand, just like I had liked Jake. Talking with him was a breeze.” She shivered, pulling the taffeta closer to her. “People are so complicated, Michael. Messy and weird and confusing. They’re way too sarcastic or they say things they don’t mean or they mean things they don’t say. But not Jeremy. He was like one of those flashcards they used to show me in special ed. It was like he was a robot.”

She fell silent too, until they were sitting in the dim fluorescent light silently together. Michael scooted over and sat next to her, putting a hand around her shoulders so she could rest her head on his shoulder.

“I thought that had to just be me. But when I saw you in the gym that day I knew that someone else saw it too. Then I couldn’t stop seeing it.” She sighed, a long and heavy exhale, and Michael squeezed her tighter. “Don’t you wish sometimes that we could just unknow this?”

Michael exhaled, long and hard. Christine’s hair was tickling his nose. “Sometimes. I don’t know, sometimes I wish I had never met Jeremy Heere. But most of the time I feel like I’m actually doing something with my life now. I had just been living before. For the first time I’m thinking about somebody besides myself.”

“Oh.” She looked up at him. “I think I’m good to go outside now.”

“Yeah,” Michael said, “me too.”

But life thrusted like weeds between cement, and the high school life continued in its steady churn even as Michael’s was set astray in an ocean of uncertainty. He felt battered by circumstances outside his control. Then again, what was?

Jeremy wasn’t.

For the first time in his life Michael showed up to school Friday morning a whole hour early. He was almost late for class anyway, of course, but sitting in an empty parking lot in the back seat of a car making out with Jeremy was thoroughly worth it.

Quite possibly the biggest regret of his life was that all that Michael to offer was a PT Cruiser for this. Jeremy made fun of him relentlessly about it, but it wasn’t like he had a car either. Michael had the irrational impression that he needed a Mustang to make himself remotely worthy of making out with Jeremy in the back of it, but the Popemobile wouldn’t have been good enough for him. Besides, he wanted the crappy nerd, he got the crappy nerd car. He knew what he had signed up for.

They broke for air, Michael slumped against Jeremy’s chest, and it wasn’t until he looked up that he realized Jeremy had the goofiest smile pasted on his face.

Michael raised an eyebrow, not even making an effort to fix his thoroughly tangled hair. “Someone’s in a good mood.”

“How could I not be?” He leaned in to kiss Michael again, faster but gentle. “I’m so glad we had that talk. I’ve been feeling just so...energetic!” He grinned, a bright and wide slash across his slight face. “It’s been killing me how I’m not allowed to talk to you during the school day. Well, a little. But you know what I mean.”

“Allowed is a funny word for it.”

“I’m even cool with how you’re dating Christine. You were right, it’s the perfect cover. I’m getting what I really want here anyway.” Michael was being forced to wonder how Christine’s feelings were factoring into this. “I’m not going to lie, it sucked at first. I basically wanted to throttle you.”

“Wait, what?”

But Jeremy barrelled on anyway, eyes shining. “But I know you like me, not her. And I like you too!” He exhaled, shifting his arm so it was reaching across Michael’s shoulders, an odd mimicry of Michael hugging Christine the day before. “God, it feels so good to say it. Michael, it feels so good to feel it.”

Despite everything Michael couldn’t help but smile, reaching upwards to kiss him again. “Like puppies dancing on your heart. Ooh, or birthday cake.”

“Like perfect hair.” Jeremy sighed dreamily. “Or that nice cologne at Sephora.”

“You are literally the vainest person I’ve ever met.” But he had known that going in, and Michael couldn’t keep the affection out of his voice. “I think it feels a little like beating Metroid and seeing Samus Aran in that bikini.”

“Or that certificate you get when you finish the National Pokedex.” As usual, the thought of Jeremy playing Pokemon was hilarious. After almost an hour of begging he had pulled out his old 3DS game of Pokemon Sun from when they were kids. His team was painstakingly adorable, and they were all named things like ‘The Destroyer’ or ‘Batman’. “Or seeing some wannabe start crying when Chloe tells them their bag’s a fake.”

“Gotta love making people cry,” Michael said weakly.

“Don’t be like that. It’s their fault they’re crying. If they didn’t want to lose they shouldn’t have played the game.” He absentmindedly began stroking Michael’s arm. “They’re not good people like you are.”

“Last time I checked I’m a loser too.”

“Relax, I’m just messing around.” He grinned and pecked Michael on the cheek. “You’re so serious sometimes.”

“I’ve had a lot on my mind.”

Jeremy kissed him again, on the mouth this time, and Michael eagerly reciprocated. They broke apart and Jeremy said teasingly, “Is it me?”

“You have no idea.”

Jeremy laughed, shifting again so Michael was lying on his chest and their legs were tangled together. The car was hot and the cloth seats stuck to their sweaty clothes, the cicadas buzzing outside their tin box, but it was so crowded it was like there was nothing there but him and Jeremy, tangled up in their little oasis where the world was outside and he could pretend, if only for right now, that the conspiracy was outside too.

Cool fingers began pricking through his scalp, and Michael half-closed his eyes as Jeremy ran his hands through his hair. Jeremy was a hot pressure at his back and a warm bicep stretched across his chest, and Michael rose his own hand to tangle with it.

“I could work with this,” Jeremy said lightly, and Michael was too sleepy to wonder what he meant. It was eight am, and if they stayed like this for much longer he would definitely fall asleep. “Yeah. A haircut works wonders, you know. It’s all about how it frames the face.”

“I’m the fuckin Mona Lisa,” Michael yawned. “Why do I have to get a haircut?”

“Some exfoliation cream too. We can use my formula, it’s really awesome. Did Brooke and Chloe take you shopping? That could work.”

“What are you on about?” The tin box was gently warming in the morning sun, just enough for the sunlight to prickle on Michael’s skin and make him desperate for his own bed with Jeremy beside him.

“It’s me helping you, silly.” Jeremy released his fingers from Michael’s hair and crossed it over Michael’s other shoulder, leaving him pinned. “I think you could use some help with the diction too. You mumble a bit.”

Something cold was creeping down Michael’s neck, made stark by Jeremy’s warm breathing and the spring sun.

Jeremy hadn’t noticed his hesitation, happily picking Michael to pieces. “You slouch like the Hunchback of Notre Dame, but that’s not so hard to fix. It’s all about the stance, Michael. You have a good start, you’ve already wormed your way into the in group. It’ll be a problem how you’ve alienated the jocks, but they don’t have to like you. If everyone else does they can just pretend.”

His heart, happily humming with joy from kissing and warmth, began to take on a different pace. “Jeremy, how is this helping me?”

“I’m helping you not be a loser. Come on, you’ve always wanted this. You’re so lucky to have me around, right?” He gave Michael’s shoulder a playful shake. “Trust me, you’re not going to be one of those other wannabes. You just have to put in a little effort, like helping me man that bake sale booth for NHS on Monday. It’s a pain but it’s all about showing that you have commitment to the community.  You’re going to be the real deal.”

Crap. Crap! “I’m sorry, man, I don’t think I can do that.”

“Don’t worry! If even I can get my shit together, you’ve got this in the bag.” His speech had picked up, excited as Jeremy rarely was. “You’re amazing, Michael. The rest of the world needs to see that.”  
“Can you let go of me?” Michael asked quietly.

“What? Why?” He had barely even heard, too caught up in his dream. “You’d look really hot in designer jeans. I’m thinking one of those trendy grunge rock band t-shirts, but we have to lose the gauges. You have to get a handle on that gross stubble too, you look like a Mexican.”

“Let go of me!” Michael pushed himself off of Jeremy, almost overbalancing on their tangled legs. The warm car suddenly felt stuffy, the oasis of them suddenly claustrophobic. The car had to be locked, he had to be trapped inside. If he knocked on the windows and screamed nobody would let him out.

He forced himself not to jump outside, wrangling the anxiety down. He had been on edge lately. The fear was only fear. The car door wasn’t locked.

When he turned around he saw that Jeremy’s eyes were wide and innocent, ignorant of what he could have possibly done wrong. “What did I say?”

Don’t get angry. Jeremy was pure, in his own way— he never understood once why he was doing something wrong. In Jeremy’s world, at least, he was perfect.  Michael sucked in a deep, rattling breath. “What you said was picking me apart and criticizing me.”

Jeremy stared at him blankly. “It’s not criticizing if it’s true.”

In Jeremy’s world maybe that would have been a compliment. Maybe it was compliment enough that Jeremy thought he was amazing, that he could be the real deal, that Jeremy was willing to help him get there if he poked and prodded and preened himself into shape. Well, wasn’t he just a saint.

“Okay, that’s it.” He scrambled up, and Jeremy reluctantly separated from him. His eyebrows were still bent in confusion, and maybe even a little hurt. “I don’t need you pointing out all my flaws. I know I have flaws and I happen to like them. We’re buddies and we’re used to each other. I don’t need to be fixed.”

“What are you saying?” His eye was beginning to twitch. This conversation was speeding up way too close to Jeremy’s comfort zone, and Michael knew they had to veer away soon for both of their sanities. “This isn’t anything against you, Michael. You aren’t nearly as pathetic I as used to be. You could just be a little better, that’s all.” He leaned in, eyes shining, even as Michael leaned away. His heart was beginning to beat faster into his throat. “It would just be a few quick fixes. Maybe a few deep ones too. It’s a little hard getting fixed, but I know you could tough it out. Then we’d have a new you!”

Michael’s mouth was dry. He shook his head. There were too many things to be said and not nearly enough, and he had to settle for repeating dumbly, “I don’t need to be fixed.”

“Who doesn’t need to be fixed? Come on, don’t be egotistical.” Jeremy gestured at himself. “See, I’m not fixed either. You know I’m whiny and clumsy and bony and pale and my bone structure is shit and I’m really, really stupid.”

“Jeremy, you’re valedictorian.”

“That’s exactly what I mean!” His voice softened and he grabbed Michael’s hands, tugging him in closer. Michael, despite himself, let him. “I’m valedictorian even though I’m a raging moron. I could do the same thing for you. What do you want, Michael? I want to give it to you.”

“I want out of this car.”

His face fell. Michael could only imagine how this looked from his perspective. The limitless generosity of Jeremy Heere taking pity on the loser Michael, offering to raise him up from nothing. No— Jeremy Heere getting a crush on Michael, wanting Michael to be cool and happy just like he was cool and happy. As happy as Jeremy was.

“Don’t be like that,” Jeremy plead. He grabbed Michael’s arm, a rough and heavy weight, and Michael stiffened. They were still tangled up in each other, knees knocking against knees, feet splayed in the same corner. Michael was almost falling off the seat. “I’m just trying to help you, there’s no need to be a jerk about it.”

Comfort zone. The last thing they needed was for Jeremy to start twitching again. Michael fought to keep his voice cool and steady, the familiar weight of Jeremy’s hand on him soothing even as Michael began to wind tenser and tenser. “I don’t know what the hell your definition of help is, but you’re being creepy. You can’t just run around trying to fix the people you care about.”

Incongruously, Jeremy brightened. Without releasing Michael’s arm he reached for his backpack under the seat and rooted around in it, withdrawing something small from the front pocket in a cupped hand. “You know, I was thinking the exact same thing. I thought you might want a little extra help, right? Or you might need it, whatever. I’ve got the one thing that will solve all of your problems.”

This couldn’t be good. “You’re the one telling me I have problems,” Michael said. “I felt problem free just fine before, thanks.”

“Come on, Michael, take a chill pill.” Jeremy grinned mischievously and opened his hand to reveal a small baggie, like the kind that you store small beads in, or cocaine. Sunk into the folds of Jeremy’s hand was a small gray pill, about the size of a tic tac. “I’ve been thinking about it and I really think that this is right for you. I know it was the best thing that ever happened to me. I usually carry around some Mountain Dew for situations like this, I think I still have some in my bag—”

“Are you serious?” Michael exploded. “Drugs? Are you seriously that desperate? I don’t have to take steroids to feel good about myself!”

Jeremy only looked confused. “This is better than drugs.”

“That’s it, I’m out.” Michael wrenched his arm away, almost tripping over his feet in an attempt to grab his backpack. It was his car, but when he felt behind him for the door handle he almost expected to find it locked. He felt trapped, hemmed in even as Jeremy sat in front of him, holding some freaking steroids or some shit in his hand, looking lost. “See you at the party Saturday.”

He pushed the door open and spilled out of the car, barely catching himself before face planting in the tarmac. He swung his backpack on and didn’t run away even as he felt like he did, even as he refused to turn around to see Jeremy’s sweetly confused expression. He just didn’t understand why somebody would choose to live as a loser like Michael when they can be a pretty, perfect douchebag like Jeremy!

He kicked the cement, regretting it the second his toe started hurting. Stupid sexy assholes! Why did he have to ruin all of their nice kissing time with talking!

The guy had psychological issues. Serious psychological issues. Possibly brainwashed, but definite psychological issues.

Michael slowed down from his angry stalking into a grumpy amble as he finally jumped down onto the giant slab of cement that passed for a parking lot. He had parked his car around the corner in the far back faculty parking lot, and it was only when he passed through the gates into the school that he was able to exhale. The familiarity lulled him back in, the same students hanging out in their favorite before school corners every day, and if he walked deeper into the courtyard he could find the popular kids, lounging in a strange exhibition of their perfect selves in front of the library.

They waved at him this time, Chloe posing against the brick railing of the stairs as Brooke was blatantly checking her out at the other end. Christine, who had been waiting there ever since Michael had dropped her off that morning, made a little heart with her hands before she saw the expression on his face, after which her happiness was a bit more forced. Rich was hanging upside down off the same railing Chloe was leaning on, legs slung over the top, shirt fallen down to his armpits. Jake was anxiously looking down at him.

“Swell Michael Mell!” Rich called, unfortunately. “You seen Jeremy? I never got my shirt back from his place!”

“No, he’s too busy shooting up heroin in the bathroom,” Michael sneered. “Come on, Christine.”

“Oh— okay!” She let Michael take her by the hand and drag her away, Chloe and Brooke turning around from where they stood to frown at them. Brooke was chewing her hair, but her eyes were crinkled deep in thought.

“Is everything okay?” She glanced over at Chloe, who also looked almost concerned. “We’re still on for the party tomorrow?”

“The party,” Michael said dangerously, “is so on.”

“That’s the kind of spirit I like to hear!” Rich, their unfortunate victim who the entire party was going to be held for, yelled. “Let’s get white girl wasted, guys!”

“Please don’t break any of my things again,” Jake said, long suffering.

From where he was swinging upside down Rich placed a solemn hand over his heart. “I swear to our lord and savior Freddie Mercury that I will not accidentally wreck any of your shit this time.”

“Sure, Rich,” Jake said. He may not have been the brightest bulb in the box but he was no sucker. “Just try and behave for once, okay?”

“Are you kidding me?” Rich’s sharklike grin stretched upside down over his face so it looked like a grimace. “My best behavior is mandatory.”

They had time to decode that later. For the time being Michael settled on ducking inside the library with Christine, immediately darting into the stacks where rows upon rows of kids were sleeping. They arranged themselves so it may look like they were kissing, maybe.

Michael leaned in. “I take it back. He’s not brainwashed, he’s a druggie.”

Christine, short black hair messy with morning sloppiness and denim dress laden with stim toys in the pockets, blinked up at him. Instead of the million other things she could have said to that sentence— agreements, disagreements, shock— she settled for saying instead, “He can be both.”

They both looked significantly outside, where Rich was talking loudly about the pussy he wanted to score at the party. It was a miracle anybody thought that boy was heterosexual.

Michael quickly explained to her what Jeremy said, watching her eyebrows crease deeper and deeper. He finished by exhaling gustily, scrabbling his hair with his hands. He couldn’t forget Jeremy’s soft fingers running through them only thirty minutes ago, how it sent smooth, curling jolts of energy through him. “I think he actually thought he was helping me. But it was just...it was just so creepy. The way he just said that he could fix me.” Michael shook his head, banishing the thoughts away. “And then he just kept on going on about how terrible he was. Christine, I like him so much, but he’s bad news.”

“And you think that this makes him less brainwashed,” Christine said slowly, watching him carefully. “Not more.”

“Yes! No! I don’t know.” Michael scrubbed his face with his hands. His day had been too long for it to have only just started. “At this point I just think he’s a creep with hideously low self-esteem who was given way too many drugs. Also, I’ve seen him try to fix his hair in the rear view mirror for a solid ten minutes straight. He cannot walk past a mirror without looking at himself.”

“I thought you liked that about him.” She paused. “Well, mildly tolerated. Michael, is that really all you think of him? Do you think that’s really all he is?”

All of who Jeremy was was just too complicated. Jeremy was a nerd who liked video games, a giant douchebag, a mild asshole, a vain airhead, the valedictorian, a player and a queer person. He was the only human being Michael had ever seen who genuinely had swag, whatever the hell that was, and he basically had a fan club. He hated to read but he was well read. He used to stand by and laugh as Rich beat up freshmen and when he looked at Michael his eyes were soft.

In what universe was the only explanation for this that he was a pod person? Pod people weren’t this complicated. People shouldn’t even be this complicated. Michael was sick of the juggling act.

He shook his head, as if that would somehow make it stop hurting. “He has horrible ideas, and if that’s brainwashing then fine. If taking steroids or whatever is brainwashing, whatever. It’s still his fault. He doesn’t have to believe all of that. None of them do. He’s the one trying to tell me the good news and he’s the one who keeps going on about fixing me!”

“I thought we agreed that Rich was trying to escape,” Christine said, eying Michael.

“Look me in the eyes and tell me that Rich doesn’t enjoy hurting people,” Michael said flatly, and Christine looked away. “Yeah. They’re all nuts, Christine.”

“We’ll find out during the party,” Christine said, “one way or another.”

“Fine. Whatever.” Michael massaged his brow, desperately trying to ignore the ache in his temples. “After the party I’m done. After all we do is find out that Rich is just a weirdo I’m done with all of this. I’m done with Jeremy. If you want to be done too, then…” he trailed off. “I guess there’s no point in keeping this up.”

“Michael, I don’t—”

“We have two options here, Christine,” Michael said impatiently. They weren’t in the most discreet location but Michael didn’t care. His chest was still heaving, and it still felt oddly stuffy. He still felt trapped in that car, pounding on the windows unable to escape as Jeremy clenched his hand over his wrist and talked endlessly about how horrible Michael was, how horrible he was, how horrible the whole damn world was that it was the kind of world that let people like Jeremy exist and hate themselves. “Either he has some kind of autonomy or he doesn’t. Either he’s a zombie or he’s been re-educated by the Clockwork Orange people. So either what I’ve been doing is grossly unethical or he’s a dick. Maybe someone who was made into a dick, forced into it, or had something else horrible happen to him, but a dick. Christine, once the brainwashing is gone, who Jeremy is will still be there. No matter what, no matter why, that person Jeremy’s become will still be him. That person? A dick.”

He braced himself for a protest or a counter argument or even her sad puppy dog eyes, but Christine just looked resigned. “I’m sorry he scared you. People who you’re intimate with shouldn’t be scary to us.” Michael looked away, eyes burning. “I’m sorry, Michael. I’ve been so focused on the conspiracy I’ve forgotten who Jeremy is to you. If you really think you’re in danger from him of course you should step away.”

Michael’s throat burned. “If he’s a danger to me then he’s a danger to you too.”

“It’s different,” Christine said firmly. “And I won’t feel bad about hitting him on the head with a fire extinguisher. Michael, I don’t think the conspiracy is fake. I believe in it. I’ll keep fighting for it.” She looked away, tucking her chin and brushing a stray lock of hair away from her ear. “Even if you won’t.”

This was some mood to be in for a party that weekend.

Both for the sake of appearances and for the sake of their horrible moods Michael and Christine hugged long and tight before they had to get to class, and when they seperated Michael mourned more than one separation. The dating had been a nice lie. His relationship with Jeremy had been an even nicer one.

He was so stupid, but what else was new. Maybe that was another thing Jeremy could fix.

He slogged through class, moving his feet through molasses, as he wondered why he couldn’t stop falling for the wrong guys even if he tried. It felt inevitable that he would fall for Jeremy, as if he couldn’t help himself. Grabbed by the ankle, not so much dragged as pulled downwards into a choppy sea. He was drowning in these feelings, choked by indecision and fear and neo conspiracies, and time after time he refused to come up for air because the hand that held his ankle was so soft and gentle and gave him a warm embrace in the night.

Jeremy was warm, warm as sunlight creeping in through his windowpane, warm as a hot car in March. But sometimes he made Michael feel cold, as cold as a distant look, as cold as a bright and empty smile, as cold as the choppy sea.

Michael wanted to come up for air, but he didn’t know how.

The thought stayed his hand the next day, dressed up in whatever weird things Chloe and Brooke had made him buy, hand hovering over his keys on the key tree near the door. He wanted to save the day and rescue the girl, but he wished he knew if the girl wanted to be saved or not. If the girl needed saving from anything other than herself.

His mother poked her head into the living room, catching sight of him lingering awkwardly in front of the door. Her eyes widened as Michael turned around, taking in his black jean jacket over a stylish and faded Star Wars movie poster shirt. He was wearing heavily distressed jeans and boots, and Michael was forced to admit that he was dressed a little like he normally did except for the fact that he looked way, way better. Brooke had explained to him that they didn’t want to make it look like he was trying too hard by changing his look up completely, and that just by changing the fit and the style of a lot of the clothes he could pull off the spirit of his regular clothing. Michael had been surprised that this had not required an elaborate montage and/or selling his soul. Somebody ought to tell Jeremy.

“Somebody looks nice. Out for a date with your beard?”

For fuck’s sake. Michael pinched the bridge of his nose, already way too exhausted for this. “For the last time, Mom, calling her a beard simplifies this very complex situation. We like to think of our relationship as a smokescreen to hide our covert operations.”

“That’s nice. I hope you’re using protection.”

“Mom!”

But she just laughed and tightened her bathrobe, walking forward to ruffle his hair and look him up and down. She smiled, somewhat sweet, somewhat sad. “My little boy’s growing up. Here he is, out to parties.”

Michael groaned. “Come on, Mom.”

“Shush, let me have this.” She patted him on the cheek, making him bat her hand away and scowl. “I worry about you so much. You never seemed to become close with anyone.”

The earlier conversation with Jeremy tasted bitter on his tongue. “I get it, I’m a loser,” Michael bit out. “Look, I’m going to be late.”

“You know that’s not what I mean.” Her eyes softened, a strangely fond look for her. Her love for him was overwhelming, even Michael knew that, but it had always felt as casual as she was. “You were just always afraid to get close. You’re so wonderful and you have so many amazing qualities. There’s a million things you love to do and you do them so passionately it’s always amazed me.”

“All of the stuff I like is nerd shit, Mom,” Michael said glumly. “Nobody cares how deeply I care about video games or old pinball machines. All my sparkling personality traits don’t matter because nobody cares about me.” His mother opened her mouth, and he quickly followed it up with, “I know you and Dad and Lola and Lolo love me but you all have to so you don’t count.”

“Of course we don’t. Does your beard girl care about you?” She crossed her arms. “Or that white boy you keep making eyes at?”

“I would literally die for Christine and fuck Jeremy,” Michael said instantly.

“Ah, high school. How I do not miss it.” His mother reached in and hugged him, and Michael let himself melt into it. She was his mother, completely and totally, and a hug from her could only ever be perfect. “Michael, if you think nobody cares about you then you have to care about yourself. If you’re so convinced nobody out there will give you a hand when you need one then learn to stand on your own. Give your hands and your hearts to other people. They’ll return them to you, Michael, one hundred fold. Please be kind to yourself.”

“Mom…” Horribly, Michael found himself a little choked up. He squeezed her tighter. “Mom, I don’t know if everything’s going to turn out okay.”’

“You can handle it, no matter what it is. And if you cannot your friends will help. And I will help you always, no matter what. Simply ask.” She released him and gave him a peck on the cheek, making him scrunch up his nose. “This is my way of telling you to call me if you’re drunk and to absolutely never drive drunk ever, because I will personally sue my own son for driving under the influence. I will send your skinny ass to jail.”

“You already send me to my room! Is nothing enough for you?”

“My hunger is insatiable.” She plucked his keys from the tree and pressed them into his hands, smiling gently. “Go. Have a nice time. But not too nice. You really have no idea what a relief it is for me that your girlfriend is a beard. It is just this huge load off my mind.”

Guilt twisted in Michael’s gut. “Uh, yeah.”

“At least you can’t get your secret boyfriend pregnant,” she said blithely, and Michael choked on his spit. “If you don’t go you’re going to be late, honey.”

He went, glad that there was someone, at least, who would save him if he asked.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember, kids: if your partner ever makes you feel afraid, intimidated, anxious, coerced, or if they try to sell you quantum nanotechnology CPUs, make like Michael and get the hell out of dodge. You deserve better.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is my favorite chapter.

 

Judging from all those cool high school TV shows and Mean Girls marathons he would have thought that house party involved the house literally jumping up and down like a cartoon and people screaming, as if they were actually in a house that was jumping up and down. Michael had done his part in selling Chloe the alcohol after school, and he technically had full right to be there. He had God’s permission to be there. Chloe Valentine had taken him to the mall to buy clothing and he had given her love life advice. Dammit, he belonged.

Which he what he told himself as he slithered between groups of people. God, this was going to be awkward. He was going to be hugging the wall all night. Oh, god, those girls were definitely looking at him. They were definitely asking themselves why he was there. They could smell his Old Spice. They could see his sweat.

Jake’s house was weirdly big, strangely sterile, and dusky with teenage ambiance. It was colder than he had imagined, which Michael was glad for. He couldn’t take another sweltering box again. The empty pedestals that probably normally held vases were smooth and varnished, humble chandeliers on the vaulted ceiling in the lobby, and the living room held an elongated corner couch of soft leather and a faintly sticky grime on the edges. Michael hadn’t gotten a taste for exactly how big the house was, but he expected it was somewhere in the realm of three stories. There was a lobby and a game room and an assembly of portraits hanging on the wall as you descended the stairs. Michael stopped to look at them, pressing against the wall so no teenage girls in tight dresses and high heels pushed him away, and even as he felt distinctly like he was rooting through Jake’s medicine cabinet he couldn’t help but look.

It was a line of school pictures, every grade from kindergarten. Jake had been an adorable kid with a gap toothed smile, complete with a stiff button up shirt and a tie for his first communion picture. Above him were faded pictures of some grandparents who happened to look young, and below him were some dogs and some honeymoon pictures of a couple posing against the Empire State Building. They were attractive and well dressed. There weren’t any pictures of them all together. Michael supposed that it was how his family was - loving but separate. At least he hoped they were loving. Michael had never really known anything else.

Michael wondered if Jeremy’s dad was abusive. Michael had ran into the cheerfully oblivious man several different times and he seemed the exact opposite, even when he prodded the man about gay rights when Jeremy was out of the room. It was weird, but Michael had genuinely liked him. Still, you never know.

At least he had actually shown up with a date. Christine had disappeared to make some weird concoction in the kitchen that she had assured him would be extremely alcoholic. He had seen her shaking a bottle of Everclear, which was deeply worrying, but as he leaned across the bannister and watched drunk girls sing along to Whitney Houston in the living room he couldn’t help but sing under his breath. He didn’t really ‘Wanna Dance With Somebody’ right now. Also, the girls looked impossibly dumb, with messed up hair and dripping makeup. Maybe when Christine came back he could make fun of them with her.

He skulked into the kitchen and stuffed Oreos into his mouth, slithering around circles of people clutching sweaty beer cans and laughing. They were trying hard to have a good time. This was an elite high school house party, even if that was an oxymoron, and it was valuable training for college. They had to hit the ground running once the points actually started mattering. Nobody wanted to be the somebody in high school only to turn into a nobody.

The real miracle was they thought that it mattered in the first place.

People were clustered on the main couches, girlfriends draped over boyfriends, and a football game was on even if nobody seemed to be watching it. He couldn’t count the number of straight people making out, snuggled up around each other or standing close together even as their gazes were far apart. Single girls drifted frantically between men, and single men lingered awkwardly against the wall as they frantically tried to make a single girl look at them. They missed each other, ships in the night.

When Michael caught Jake it was completely on accident, almost bumping into him as Jake was leaned against the stove, crumpling beer into his mouth. The man was gigantic, and even as Michael saw the debris of beer cans around him he was still slugging it back.

Unfortunately, Jake caught him too. He raised a beer can in a toast, laughing and beckoning Michael over. He reluctantly sidled up, ignoring the way Yolanda curled her lip at him, and carefully nudged the beer cans away so he could lean against the counter. On second thought, he reached across the island in front of them to grab an empty beer can, pretend to crack it, and bring it to his lips.

Thankfully, Jake laughed. “Live a little, Mell! Damn, is this your first party?”

“Yep.” Michael pretended to take a swig of the beer, and grimaced for effect. “This is so freaking gross.”

“It tastes better the drunker you get,” Jake said amicably. He leaned against the stove, elbows propped on the back, making Michael naturally a little nervous. He took a long swing, exhaling heavily. “I remember my first house party. I was like what, eight?”

Michael’s eyebrows rocketed up. “What kind of elementary school hoedown was that?”

Jake hiccuped, waving a hand. “Nah, it was my folks’. They had invited a shitton of people over to drink and shit. They put me to bed but it was too loud to sleep so I snuck out anyway.” His eyes softened fondly, and he swished around his beer a little. “Man, was it cool. Margaritas and tacky jewelry and old ladies with way too much makeup. Dunno who they were, maybe business friends. The old ladies thought I was real cute, so they snuck me some screwdrivers until I got totally hammered.” His lip twitched in what was probably supposed to be a smile. “Threw up everywhere. Man, did my mom get mad.”

It was a little uncertain if this was a fond memory or a sour one, but Michael knew from experience that sometimes they were one and the same. Still, something in Jake’s eyes caught him. All Michael could do was offer a weak, “I’m sorry. Do you miss them?”

Jake barked a laugh. “If you knew how mad my mom got you wouldn’t ask.” His face was a little ruddy, and Michael considered that he may be drunker than he had thought. “Nah, she was pretty alright. Nowhere near Rich’s parents. Fucking psychos.”

The thought pulled awkwardly at Michael’s gut, and he couldn’t help but remember his crack last month about Rich’s parents beating him. Well, it wasn’t nearly as bad as most of the shit Rich had said to him, but some things just weren’t right to say. “You two must be really good friends,” Michael said carefully.

But Jake just looked down at his can, swinging it around a little and letting a gentle smile drift onto his face. It could only be described as fond. For Rich. Fond. Again, for Rich. “I don’t know if Rich can have any good friends. We’re as close as you can be with him, I guess. There’s a lot more to him than it looks, Mike.” He swallowed thickly. “I hope so, anyway.”

“Really? Because he looks like a psycho.” Michael realized too late that this wasn’t a nice thing to say to someone’s best friend, but Jake only shrugged. It was fair.

“He’s that too. But he also pretends a lot. He doesn’t believe any of the crap he says, really. It’s just to get a rise out of people.”

“You mean to be an asshole,” Michael said flatly. “He says it to hurt people.”

“That’s just what he does,” Jake said, and Michael was blown away by how anybody would wearily accept Rich. If someone could accept even Rich unconditionally, then anybody could deserve it. “I’m not saying that what he says or does always make sense. Like, most of the time it makes no sense whatsoever. But there’s a lot of stuff about him he told me never to tell anybody, under any circumstances.” Jake swallowed, masking it with a swig of beer. “Even if...even if he is sick, you know? Sometimes he just goes away inside. I’d rather have the old Rich back being an asshole and rolling his eyes at me all the time then have him be empty again.”

It was more unbelievable than the pod people, the Clockwork Orange brainwashing machine, or whatever the hell they were searching for. Jake smiled when he thought of Rich and he knew things about him that nobody else knew. That was probably because nobody wanted to know anything about Rich whatsoever, but in a house sick with the ambiance of sweaty teenagers, the thick stench of beer and the scattered couches and crumbs, some weird sort of affection thrived despite it all.

No, affection would have never survived when Rich worked so hard to be hated. It could have only been deeper than that.

“You love him,” Michael said, the realization growing within him. “You love him, don’t you?”

Whatever Jake thought about that, however he might have felt, he didn’t let Michael know. He just shrugged, chugging the rest of the beer and crumpling the can in one fist before he dropped it in the grimy and grouty sink, and clapped Michael on the back. “Thanks for the beer, dude. Go have a good fucking time. Hold hands with Christine or some shit.”

“Wait, did you know that she’s -”

“Hard to miss, dude.” He shrugged, wiping his mouth and exhaling heavily, shaking his head like a dog. “Haven’t said anything cuz I was afraid Jeremy might give her shit. Or Rich. It’d be douchey of him to pick on my ex-girlfriend, but he hates all of my exes, so whatever.”

“Gee,” Michael drawled, “wonder why.”

“Yeah, he hates everybody.” Not quite what he meant, but okay. Someone across the room screamed enthusiastically, and Jake screamed enthusiastically back. “Hold your horses, fuckers, I’m coming!”

He disappeared into the crowd, and when Michael saw Jeremy chatting with a girl in the doorway he knew it was time to move on.

Michael was man enough to admit that he was completely avoiding Jeremy. The thought sent a cold twist of guilt through his stomach, but they were pretty much the experts at avoiding each other. Jeremy had texted him earlier that day, as well as called him several times. Michael had ignored all of them. He pulled out his phone, squinting at it in the dim light as he slowly moved away from Jeremy, ducking into a side hallway where someone was getting to second base.

 **6069238454:** I’m sorry if I hurt your feelings. I mean I don’t know how I did but I did. You get offended at a lot of random things so it’s hard to keep track.

 **6069238454:** Sorry, that sounded bitchy.

 **6069238454:** I’m normally better at this but it’s really hard to act normal around you.

 **6069238454:** I normally don’t have to apologize to people.

 **6069238454:** You’re the only one who makes me do that.

 **6069238454** : Michael pick up your phone you’re not being mature.

Sure enough, he had a few missed calls. Which was bizarre - Jeremy never called him. A few hours later he texted again.

 **6069238454:** I can’t believe you’re giving me the silent treatment. You’re acting like a child.

 **6069238454:** If you want to be one so bad I’ll treat you like one

 **6069238454:** Wait, did that sound creepy? It sounded a little creepy.

 **6069238454:** That came out wrong lol. I’ll see you at the party we can talk then

Michael, in fact, did not want to see him at the party.

Michael, in fact, did not want to see him at all.

He couldn’t do this any longer. They had to break up. He had always known that Jeremy was debatably brainwashed, but he had never given him the creeps before. Maybe he would have written it off and stayed anyway if he hadn’t known, telling himself over and over again that he was lucky to have him. Other boys would have killed to be him, so he should be grateful and shut up and stop complaining.

Michael bit his hand to stop from screaming. He had to find Christine.

He broke through the crowds, desperately staying within the populated areas and away from the dark corners where people were making out or smoking. One of the rooms stunk of weed and Michael took a deep gasp, wishing he was there instead of here, wanting to look behind him to see if Jeremy was following him even as he desperately avoided looking backwards in case he was.

He pushed past the crowd until he ducked into a relatively secluded corner off a den, taking deep breaths and pretending that he wasn’t scared. Nobody had ever told him that parties were too loud and smell disgusting and were way too claustrophobic.

Michael exhaled heavily, leaning against a fancy corner table with a nice painting above it. It was small and abstract, giving the sense of austere fragility. Michael knew how it felt.

He watched the people pass, arms around waists, the red solo cups in their hands spilling over with frothy beer. Someone had rolled in a kegger and sticky booze was coating the floors. Michael had no idea how Jake was going to clean this up all by himself later. He probably had a maid or something.

There was something vaguely surreal about it, almost an out of body experience. Here Michael was, looking as nice as he could get in his new clothes and slotted right into the popular life. Getting himself invited to parties and shit. Giving love life advice. Maybe he should get Rich and Jake together? That might be good for them. Not that Michael cared literally at all about Rich’s well being.

In the den he could see Brooke and Chloe cuddled on the couch surrounded by their admirers. They were topping off each other’s drinks and Michael couldn’t help but smile. Somehow he had the feeling that they would make a cute couple. This was real mlm/wlw solidarity right here.

He was so caught up in imagining their bisexual takeover that he almost missed Christine running up to him, towing along a very unwelcome figure in her wake. She had several cans of soda folded underneath her arm and was practically dragging along the other figure, who was rolling his eyes and giving what Tyler had accurately named ‘Dealing With Stupid People’ expression.

“Michael!” She chirped. “What have you been doing?”

“Suffering.” Michael accepted the can of lukewarm can of Coke she handed him, taking the opportunity to bend down and kiss her. She tasted like Dr. Pepper and showtime. “Are you having fun?”

“Yeah!” She replied, eyes dead inside and begging for release. “I’m having so much fun. Maybe even...too much fun?”

Michael furrowed his brow in his best ‘uh-oh’ expression. “If you’re feeling overstimulated then you should take a break. Nobody’ll mind if you sit this one out for a little while.”

Rich stuck his hands in his pockets, completely unimpressed with the both of them. At least he wasn’t feeling his particular brand of murder towards him today. But even as unimpressed as he was he was looking around a little anxiously too.“I’m supposed to be looking for Jake. Why am I here.”

Please. If Christine wanted you to be somewhere you were there and you liked it. She wasn’t just the stage manager of play rehearsal, she was the stage manager of life. She batted her eyelashes at him in a complete domination over his free will. “I wanted to hang out with you, silly! I feel like we never talk anymore.”

“Yeah, because you’re always hanging out with your boyfriend,” Rich sneered. But he was glancing around nervously too, shoulders almost hunched in on themselves. “I’m busy. I’m looking for Jake and I was about to score with Monica when you kidnapped me. We can have a sleepover later.”

“Isn’t Monica dating Kyle?” Michael pointed out.

Rich gave him a blank look. “So? Kyle’s my bitch, he’ll roll over and take it. Fucking cuck.”

Wasn’t this guy just lovely. Jake was definitely coming from a rational, logical place when he threw his lot in with this guy.

He knew Christine had to be feeling the same way, but she didn’t let an ounce of it show. She hadn’t stopped smiling, either, but she had somehow turned it knowing and kind.

“You’re feeling kind of overstimulated too, right?”

Michael’s first impulse was to say that Rich had the stimulation of a live wire, but against all odds Rich actually looked away in embarrassment. He grunted, a hoarse pig like song that Christine was somehow able to interpret.

She smiled and grabbed his hand, subtly passing the other two sodas she was holding to Michael. He stuffed them in the pockets of his jean jacket. Rich wriggled uncomfortably out of the grip, so Christine took Michael’s hand instead. “Here, I have an idea. Just say that I’m wigging out and you’re going to hang out with me downstairs in the basement. It’s really cozy and has a nice couch. Then we can hang out and drink sodas!”

“Why can’t we drink beer instead?” Rich asked plainly. Michael was forced to wonder the same thing - passing him sodas in the basement as they were trying to get him plastered wasn’t the best way to go about their secret plan.

“Because you don’t drink!”

Rich froze. His eyes widened almost imperceptibly. “What did Jake tell you?”

“Jake’s the picture of discretion.” Christine shrugged. “But you know I don’t drink either, so it’s hard to miss. You just pretend all the time. I don’t think it makes you uncool! I think it means you’re respectful of the temple that is your body and that’s something to always be applauded.”

“I’m allergic,” Rich said plainly. He glared bloody murder at Michael, flexing his biceps. “Tell anyone and I’ll bash your head in, Mell.”

Apparently being alcohol intolerant was yet another thing that was too uncool to admit. Michael didn’t understand how any human nuance translated to weakness, how every crack of individuality shining through their plastic skin was anathema. God forbid Rich even have a quirk of his digestive system.

“Come on,” Christine wheedled, batting her eyes. “I’m feeling so whacked out. I really have to go somewhere it’s quiet, but I don’t know what kind of guys are down there.” She even mimicked her usual slightly heavy breathing and twitching of her head that she always got when she was overstimulated, drawing her hands in closer. Michael slung a supportive arm around her shoulder, helping her lean in. “I think those creepy Rugby guys are crashing and smoking weed down there.”

Normally Michael trusted Christine’s acting judgement implicitly, but there was no manipulating Rich. You can’t predict the weather and you can’t predict what the hell Rich is going to be up to one moment from the next. Michael was just about to try and bat for a different topic when he saw Rich draw up, crossing his arms over his chest and glowering.

“Those rugby guys are shitheads. Is that Hunter guy giving you trouble?”

Christine nodded miserably. “He called me a you-know-what.”

That didn’t actually hold any significance to Michael, but Rich’s nostrils flared. He smacked his palm with a fist. “That’s a great excuse to fuck him up! I’ll beat his ass in if he gives you trouble down there, Christine.”

Christ. Christine whimpered and curled in on herself. “Michael!”

Damn, his turn. “It’s okay, honey. Come on, let’s try to get to somewhere quieter.” He began to gently steer her towards the staircase into the basement down the way near the kitchen, but Rich grabbed his wrist instead. Christine stiffened in his arms and Michael almost growled, jerking his arm trying to throw him off.

“Jeremy’s been looking all over for you,” Rich said lightly, squeezing Michael’s wrist. Michael hissed as his skin was rubbed raw. “You ain’t giving him the cold shoulder, right?”

“Things got a little too heated up for my tastes,” he gritted out, finally breaking free of Rich’s grip. “Let’s just try and get Christine somewhere quieter, okay? I don’t need your macho bullshit today.”

Rich held out his hands in a fake conciliatory gesture. “I getchu. You’re playing hard to get.” He grinned again, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “Jeremy’s real good at that game. He’ll chase you down and pin you against the wall, then he’ll -”

“Shut the fuck up!” Michael yelled, loud enough that a few people heard despite the din and turned around only to find that Rich was being yelled at. They shrugged and went back to their solo cups. If somebody wasn’t telling Rich to shut up then he wasn’t speaking. “Just fucking help us! Christ!”

Rich shrugged, spreadings his hands out in a  ‘what can you do’ gesture. “Girls these days are so sensitive.”

But he helped them down anyway, keeping an eye out for any rugby lunatics as Christine buried her face in Michael’s shoulder and breathed deeply.

The basement was the dark underbelly of Jake’s house, cold and scuffed and musty. The cement floor was water stained and cracked in some places, and it was littered with old boxes and furniture covered in thick opaque dust covers. In the center of the room there were four giant metal shelves, holding file boxes and various kitchen implements. There were safes stacked along the wall - more safes than any law abiding citizen would typically have.

Rich, as usual, chatted aimlessly as they descended the stairs. In deference to Christine’s apparent sensory issues, he didn’t scream any of it like he usually would. “Most of their crap is in a storage locker, where I used to sleep sometimes for the fuck of it. Great couches in there, let me tell you. Real leather. Some of their stuff got seized by the IRS, but not a ton of it? This house is packed full of bullcrap. The nicer stuff is locked in the master bedroom because Jake had the stupid idea that I would run around breaking things.” Rich snorted as they tripped down the stairs. “Please. I only broke the stuff Jake hated. Granted, he hates this whole fucking house, and I really feel him there, let me tell you, but I mostly just like wrecking shit. Wood, aluminum, whatever, I’ll punch it all. It feels awesome until your knuckles rip open, then it hurts a little, but it’s a good kind of hurt, you know? Cleansing. I’m doing a public service cleansing this deadbeat school. I’m like the fucking Pope.”

Michael and Christine exchanged exasperated glances. They finally settled her on a plush armchair coated in a crinkly dust cover, and she curled up on it as Michael passed out the sodas again. Christine accepted it eagerly. “You normally drink tonic water straight, right?”

Rich shrugged, and Christine eyed him carefully as he cracked the soda open. “Antioxidants are the shit.” Strangely enough, the soda didn’t make as big of a hiss as Christine and Michael’s, but he didn’t seem to care. Michael cracked his open, letting the compressed gas slowly hiss out, and took a long and slow swing of the lukewarm Coke. Christine did the same with her grape juice, as long a swig as possible. “Gotta say, this is way better than pretending this is beer.”

He took a long swing.

Almost immediately he gagged, hoarsely coughing and beating his chest. “The fuck kind of tonic water is this?”

“I think you just swallowed it wrong,” Christine said, apparently completely serious.

Rich looked at his can of tonic water, then at the two of them. They drank their sodas innocently. He looked down at his can, which was completely sealed before he opened it.

Then he shrugged and downed the rest of it.

He fell over almost immediately.

He pushed himself back upwards, laughing hysterically, and Michael considered for the five hundredth time that his life had gotten too crazy.

“What,” he said weakly, turning to a very smug Christine curled up on the armchair like a reigning Queen, “did you put in that drink?”

“Oh, just Everclear.”

“Christine, what the fuck.”

Michael didn’t even want to think about how much Everclear Rich had just downed straight. He was shakily trying to draw himself upwards, laughing, and Michael was forced to try and help him up. He was way heavier than he looked, and Michael grunted as he tried to pull Rich up. Then Rich staggered again, feet falling out from under him, and Michael grunted as he fell flat on his ass.

“How did you even get it in there?” Michael asked, somewhat hysterically. Rich was content to lie on the ground laughing.

Christine shrugged, pushing herself off the chair to grab Rich by the hand and, with the help of Michael, tow him towards one of the large shelves laden with boxes and kitchen supplies. Michael ran up the stairs to lock the basement door, feeling like the creepiest person on planet Earth, and he turned back down the stairs just in time to see Christine withdraw a pair of handcuffs from a hidden pocket in her dress and snap one around Rich’s wrist, securing the other one around the leg of the shelf.

“Holy fuck!” Michael yelled, immediately strangling off the shout. If he yelled too loud then someone would find them hidden in the basement roofying the biggest bully in school and handcuffing him to a fucking shelf!

If it helped, Christine didn’t look so proud of herself anymore. She gave the handcuffs a good shake - Michael now recognized them as the ones from the prop department - and stood up, brushing her hands off. Nobody should allow that girl in an auditorium ever again. She had grown too strong. Christine had become too powerful.

“We have no idea how he’s going to react to this,” Christine said grimly, carefully stepping away from him. The pole Rich was handcuffed to had the first shelf up to about his admittedly short shoulder, and Rich had enough range of motion that he was just barely not slumping over. Of course, he was slumping over anyway, cheek pillowed against the cold metal. “I just hope I didn’t take it too far.”

“I think we’ve gone too far no matter what,” Michael said distantly.

No, he was being a coward. He had been nothing but a coward all day, freaking out at Jeremy and freaking out at himself, swearing to step away from this. He had responsibilities, he had a job to do, and he was willing to give it all up and leave Christine with the check as he ran for the door. He would have left her to do this all alone.

Even the handcuffs wouldn’t have helped her then.

Michael was the leader. This had been Michael’s plan, and he needed to act like it. He took a deep breath, prayed forgiveness to God, and stepped up beside Christine, looking down at Rich.

Their biggest problem was if Rich would be too drunk to talk, and it certainly seemed that way for a while. He was laughing to himself quietly, then louder, but honestly Michael had seen him cackle madly to himself when he was supposedly perfectly sober.

Out of the corner of his mouth Michael hissed, “How did you get the can to look sealed?”

Christine shrugged. “YouTube video?”

Christ.

They needn’t have worried - after a few minutes of getting his bearings, Rich started talking and couldn’t stop.

“So Jake’s parents  packed the house it to the gills with mod and art deco and art nouveau fucking fine art, which is so horribly tacky. That Charles Renne Mackintosh Ingram chair is the weakest of his bullshit collection. The Argyle chair has these warmer colors, you know?”

Amazingly, despite his slurring he was still somewhat understandable and talking as quickly as ever. Christine and Michael shared a glance as Rich kept talking. Christine had pulled out a small sheet of notebook paper from her pocket and was reading it fastidiously, mouthing the words to herself. They looked like interview questions.

Rich was still talking. “I swear to God I think I saw a genuine 1867 copy of Hamlet in a safe. You totally dug it, don’t lie. Don’t lie! You let me read it, didn’t you? Didn’t you!”

Michael and Christine looked at each other uneasily. He wanted to step away, even shield his eyes, but now Rich was pulling against the cuffs, eyes rough and bloodshot. Michael was abruptly glad for the handcuffs.

“I memorized that fucking monologue and recited it to you for hours on hours and I know you hated it. Christine! You’ve poisoned me! Christine!” He groaned and bent in on himself. “What the fuck did you put in that tonic water?”

“You aren’t going to die,” Christine soothed, even as she stepped away from him. “We just wanted to ask you a few questions. We know you’ve been trying to talk to us, Rich. This is your chance.”

“My chance to what, throw up my organs?” Even drunk he was remarkably lucid, or as lucid as he ever got. He groaned, curling in on himself. “No, I haven’t - no! I hate that bastard Mell, I wouldn’t. Jesus, I wouldn’t.” He gritted his teeth, groaning. “I’m going to kill you.”

He could have been talking to anyone with that statement. He was thrashing around now, a mixture of drunken tumbling and angry frantic attempts to escape whatever was chasing him. His handcuff rattled on the pole, metal screeching against metal, and he knew that Rich’s wrist was being rubbed raw.

“Please, Rich, this is your chance!” Christine looked almost as sick as Rich did but she pressed on. “We know about the voice in your head. We know it’s controlling you, making you do things. Help us stop it. We’re going to save you, but we need your help.”

Rich screamed through his gritted teeth, gulping giant heaving breaths. Then he looked up at them, eyes glinting, and he opened his mouth just long enough to gasp,

“Get me more of that tonic water.”

Without missing a beat Michael ran to grab the discarded can, shaking it to hear the liquid slosh around. There was still some left. A beat was thumping above their heads, teenagers swaying to the rhythm, and the incongruity of popular kids throwing their weekend benders as a brainwashing victim sat chained up in a basement almost made him want to cry.

He gently pushed Christine away and carefully reached forward to give the can to Rich, who snatched it out of his hands with a giant gulp. He gasped, coughing and dropping the can, and he slumped forwards as far as he could still handcuffed to the pole.

If they had genuinely given him alcohol poisoning Michael was going to feel like a moron for the rest of his life. He and Christine watched Rich gasp slow and shallow breaths, almost panting as the weight of the handcuff pulled on his wrist to keep him upright.

It happened in a second. Rich straightened, sitting back up, and for the first time since Michael had met him Rich was truly home.

His eyes were focused and he was sitting as straight as he could with his wrist still attached to the pole, sitting on his ass in an ignoble position. If it wasn’t for his gentle swaying it was almost impossible to tell he was drunk on a soda can full of Everclear.

When he spoke every word was forced out through gritted teeth, but his diction was clear enough that Michael couldn’t pretend he was hearing differently.

“It’s called a SQUIP.”

Michael’s blood froze. Christine clenched his hand, breathing heavily.

“It’s a quantum nanotechnology CPU. It goes inside your brain and,” Rich gasped, heaving and slouching forwards before he forced himself back up through the power of will. “The quantum computer in the pill will travel through your blood until it implants in your brain and it tells you what to do...it tells you what to do.”

Michael was numb and distant from his body.

It was real. They had been right. It had been robots. They had been turning into robots!

He had been right!

Michael shouldn’t have wanted to be right, shouldn’t have wished for this to happen, but he did. He wished to God that there was some explanation for cruelty and hate, for pettiness and insanity. It had been robots all along. It wasn’t people, it was robots.

Christine was in a similar state of shock, likely the same thoughts running through her head, and Michael forced himself to come back down to Earth. He shook her, eliciting a small gasp, and crouched down until he was meeting Rich in the eyes.

“Rich, how do we stop it? Where is it now, why is it letting you say this?”

“Alcohol makes it short out,” Rich gasped, “ ‘s why I don’t drink it. Michael, you beautiful bastard, you picked the one thing that makes it short out.” He sucked in a rattling gasp. “Too bad you’re a moron.”

“Well, it’s Rich alright,” Michael said flatly.

“Fuck off. We only have to much time. Once I sober up you’re done for.” He lolled his head up to meet Christine’s eyes. “Do you get that? It’s a network of these things. They’re in me, they’re in Jeremy - but you already knew that - they’re in Middlebury. You complete morons. You’re done for. Once it comes back online they’re all going to know and they’re going to make us shove them down your throats.” For once in his life he didn’t smile. “I’m going to personally shove it down your fucking throat, Christine, and I’m going to laugh.”

She whimpered.

“What do we do,” Michael whispered. He reached out and grabbed Rich’s shoulder, shaking it as his head lolled. He laughed, low and cold. It didn’t sound anything like his normal laugh. It sounded meaner. “Rich, how do we stop them?”

“Mountain Dew Red,” Rich said. His eyes were blown wide open in ecstasy. “Mountain Dew Red. Don’t ask me how I know, it’s a long story. It’s pointless, Michael, we’re helpless. They discontinued Mountain Dew Red years ago. It’s hopeless.”

Michael’s heart froze to a stop. He had a distant thought, almost casual, as his mind skipped over Rich’s sentence and rewound until he understood it.

Hey, he had a bottle of Mountain Dew Red under his bed.

But for Rich’s benefit, he said out loud, “We’ll find another way. There has to be something we can do.”

“Jeremy,” Christine asked frantically, and Michael realized that he should have been thinking of Jeremy all along. It should have been his first thought. “Jeremy has a SQUIP too, right? Is he okay?”

Rich grimaced and looked off to the side. “As okay as he can be. That kid is losing it. He lost it ages ago when his school...things used to be simple for us, Michael.” He glanced back at him, eyes dulled with alcohol, but present and aware like he never was. “It used to be easy. Do what it said, live like it wanted, learn to like it all. You and it become one and everything’s peaceful. I felt it for a long time. Jeremy felt it. Until he met you, Michael Mell, we were at peace.” He sucked in a rattling gasp. “He just had to fall in love with you, didn’t he?”

Michael’s mouth was dry. “Yeah,” Michael said, “I couldn’t help it either.”

“I love that kid, as much as I can love anyone.” Rich laughed lowly. “I love Jake, god fucking dammit. I’ve protected Jeremy as much as I can, I’ve dropped all the hints I could to you, and thank God in heaven you aren’t as much of a dumbass as you look.” He even smiled. “Untie me so I can kill myself. I can’t live like this. I never liked living, anyway.”

“I’m not doing that,” Michael said dumbly. “We - we can still fix this, it’s not too late.”

“I have the self-preservation instinct of a lemming,” Rich said, impossibly dry. “There’s nothing in my life worth sticking around for. It’s going to use me to hurt you. The minute it comes back online it’s going to use me to stuff a pill down your throats. It already has Jeremy after you. I hate your guts, Michael, but I don’t want Christine to live like this. Hell, I don’t even want you to live like this.”

Jeremy.

His steroids.

The pill!

Michael calmly stood up, walked over to the corner of the basement, and threw up.

Christine made a soft, pained noise. “Jeremy was trying to SQUIP you?”

“In his whacked up brain he thought he was helping you,” Rich said flatly. “Don’t blame him. What it wants it gets. Jeremy’s just a pawn.”

But Michael let himself breathe heavily, taking in three deep breaths. He wiped his mouth with his hand. There were a million things to ask, a million questions, but all Michael could settle for was one. “Was this what he wanted the whole time?”

Rich was silent.

When Michael rejoined Christine she was crying too, and Michael forced himself to calm down so she could lean against him. Things had to be okay. They were always okay in the end. Michael just really, really didn’t want to see that end.

When Rich spoke again it was soft and warm for the first time that Michael had ever heard. “That lunatic kid. I wish I had time to tell you how he got real fucking feelings for you, Michael. He didn’t have feelings when I met him. God, we don’t have enough time for this sleepover shit.” He flexed his arm, growling. “I have to...fuck. Fuck!”

“What’s wrong?” Christine asked, clearly nervous. They didn’t really know the situation could get any worse.

But Rich just exhaled, long and slow, and leaned back against the pole. He let himself breathe for a few seconds and when he opened his eyes he had accepted what he needed to, and his eyes were set in hard glints of determination. Michael was struck yet again by his strange and stubborn bravery, even if at times he was only brave against himself. Michael found himself forced to wonder if Rich knew that he was crazy. He had always figured not, but looking at the sixteen year old boy slumped in front of him he knew that this, at least, Rich had accepted.

“Let me go.”

Christine quietly withdrew a key from her bra and bent over Rich to unlock it. He didn’t stand up so much as stagger, and he leaned against the pole for another few moments breathing heavily. Eventually he pushed himself off, and his face was set in an awful sort of determination. Christine lingered next to him, anxiously playing with her fingers, and Rich smiled down at her.

“That was a hell of a plan, Christine. We didn’t suspect a thing.”

“I didn’t have a choice.”

He coughed out a laugh, and to Michael’s shock he reached out an arm and gave her a tight sidehug. Christine made soft noise of surprise and returned it. “You’re probably the one I hate the least.”

He didn’t make for the door. Michael and Christine watched him silently as he stumbled into the shelving, knocking over boxes and breaking into trunks as he pushed aside papers and old knick nacks and grandma’s art collection.

The minute Michael realized he was looking for something he rushed to join him, along with Christine, and after as long as they dared dumping boxes on the floor and letting Rich sort through them he shook his head, wobbling dangerously.

“Grab Jake’s old things. Try sophomore year, fucking go for it.”

After that it wasn’t as hard. Jake, surprisingly, was meticulous in organizing his old things. They grabbed several of the cardboard boxes marked with the year and they dumped them on the ground for Rich to go through.

Old army men collided with the pavement, binders of papers and homework. Soccer trophies and debate trophies fell over and Christine carefully fished out some picture frames and set them aside. A familiar  single tie dye bear fell out and Rich grunted.

He bent down and picked it up, holding the cheap carnival felt with one hand and giving it a little shake. It was cold and beaten, and the head lolled in every direction even as the button eyes stayed focused on you. Rich met its gaze, as if he expected to find something there, but whatever he was looking for was gone. Only a cheap tie dye bear was left, bearing an odd resemblance to Rich’s shirts, and Rich snorted a laugh.

“Can’t believe that bastard kept it. He stopped me from throwing it away, let me yell and rage at him about it, and then kept it. He knew. Dammit, he knew.”

Then Michael grabbed it by the back and pulled hard, ripping open the seams and letting the stuffing float down onto the floor. Christine and Michael looked at each other - what was the point of finding the old bear if he was just going to destroy it? - but Rich just fished a large box out of his ridiculously large pockets and stuffed it inside, pinching the back shut with his finger.

“Duct tape.”

As Christine fetched him some duct tape from one of the upturned boxes Michael remembered where he had seen the bear. It was in those pictures Tyler had given them, the two nerdy boys holding identical tie dye bears. Jake had kept his for him.

Rich mumbled to himself as he taped the beat shut, shaking it around as if he was settling the box to the bottom as he eyed it. “They’re going to comb the place afterwards. Shit’s near indestructible. As good of a hiding place as any, yeah?”

He unceremoniously dropped the bear back into a box and beamed at the both of them, clapping his hands.

“Unlock the fucking doors. We’re going to rock this joint down to the fucking ground.” He grinned, an actual grin, and jerked his thumb at himself, somehow striking a pose despite having just drank a soda can of Everclear and was on a break from being possessed by an evil robot. “Rich motherfucking Goranski’s back in town and everybody’s going to know. They’re going to see me, Michael, and I’ll be the last thing those fuckers see!”

Christine cheered, pumping her fist. “Death to the bougies!”

“Oh god,” Michael said faintly, but he unlocked the door anyway, feeling like he was letting out a monster. No, he had brought a monster in. He just didn’t know what he was releasing into the world now.

When Rich strode out into the hallway he owned the place, a strong and powerful stance as he plowed through the pulsing crowds as if they were beneath even his notice. It was different from his usual swagger and dance where he was desperate to be the center of attention in every room and willing to scream until he was. It was confidence. For the first time that Michael had seen Rich had nothing to prove.

Michael and Christine were swept along in his wake, half-apologizing to the disrupted circles of friends but mostly just trying to keep up. They exchanged their hundredth nervous glance at each other, constantly checking in to make sure that they weren’t alone in their terror.

For some horrible obscure reason, Rich made him feel weirdly secure. Someone else was finally ready to act and he was going to do it come hell or high water. Michael knew better than anyone else Rich got what he wanted.

They broke into the kitchen, and he could tell that the party was winding down. More beer cans were scattered than people, chairs knocked over and tables covered in playing cards and gum wrappers and spilt beer. From the living room Michael could hear drunk girls singing along to Whitney Houston, and some people were still crowded along the island talking. Rich shouted a hoarse yell until they scattered away, resentful but doing exactly as he said. Rich grinned back at them, kicking the stove.

“I get high on their terror. You know that, right?”

“Hard to forget,” Michael said faintly. “Uh, what are you doing? Do we have to lock you up again? No offense.”

Rich barked a sharp laugh, real and hearty. “I’ll never be able to tell you this again, Mell. I hate having to call you a fag, and calling Christine a retard, and every fucking thing else. It’s cowardly and cruel. Give me a good fight any day. I never mean it.” He kicked a cabinet open, withdrawing a giant skillet. He dropped it on the stove with a loud clang. “Man, am I going to enjoy this!”

“That’s never a good thing to hear from you.”

“Can’t argue with that!” Rich rooted around in Jake’s cabinets, and Michael didn’t miss that he knew exactly what he was looking for. He pitched his voice up. “J-Man! I’m making us some french fries!”

From the living room Michael heard a drunken yell. “Fucking yeah! I love french fries!”

Rich smiled fondly as he yanked out a giant plastic container of olive oil. “That beautiful moron. I love him so much.”

“Uh,” Michael said, intelligently. Something sad occurred to him, like he was seeing a sailor off to sea. “Anything you want me to tell him before you...go back online, I guess?”

“Everything I want him to know I never had to say.” Rich shook the container of olive oil. He turned to them seriously. “Michael, take off your jacket and your shirt. Pour water on both of them and give your shirt to Christine. When this happens you’re going to keep them both over your nose and mouth. Once I do this I’m going to have to make a break for the second story and disable all of the sprinklers and the fire alarm. I’m not coming downstairs.”

“Holy fuck,” Michael said.

“I won’t die,” Rich said, “but I’ll come just enough that I’m not a danger to you anymore. If she comes online and she sees what I know we’re toast. She’ll use to me hurt you. Michael, the moment I give the signal you’re going to shout fire as loudly as possible. After he does that, Christine, you scream.

“Holy fuck,” Christine said.

As it turned out Rich was really fucking metal.

On that cheery note Rich turned the stove on as Michael silently shucked his shirt and jacket to give to Christine and run them both over cold water. His heart was beating triple time and Christine’s hands were shaking.

Michael wondered where Jeremy was. If he would escape in time. If they hurt someone…

If the SQUIP (what kind of evil robot name was that?) came back online they would have a lot worse things to worry about than a fire.

Rich was practically whistling as he turned to heat higher and higher. He grabbed a small plastic cup advocating Seaworld from the cabinet and filled it with water. He locked the door of the kitchen, leaving them all trapped inside. There was one other door on the opposite end where the dining room fed into the kitchen, with a staircase just off to the side, that he didn’t lock. It was their escape exit. The rich boy kitchen with stainless steel microwaves and granite countertops was a prison, the same way Michael’s car had been. On some level Michael had understood what Jeremy was offering him. Even if he couldn’t have expressed it, Michael had known.

From where she stood with a death grip on Michael’s hand Christine sucked in a deep breath. “You aren’t supposed to pour water on a grease fire.”

“I don’t think he cares right now.”

She whimpered again and dove in for a tight hug, burying her head in his shoulder. “This is bad. This is real, real bad.”

“Stand back, you two,” Rich said cheerfully.

Then he poured the olive oil onto the pan. And he kept pouring and pouring.

It wasn’t immediate. Rich stood cheerfully nearby, hands on his hips, looking for all the world like a white suburban dad at a barbeque.

With a quiet whoosh the pan caught on fire, orange red flames lapping at the edge of the pans reaching a hand high. It wasn’t as drastic as Michael had feared, just a pan full of flames spitting dangerously on the stove. Christine squeaked and hid behind Michael, who wanted to hide behind Christine, but Rich only surveyed his kingdom with the majesty of a king who was about to raise his taxes sky high.

“Now this is the part where you really have to stand back.”

The two onlookers practically ran to the other side of the kitchen, crouching behind the island. Rich jumped on the island and slid over to join them, the fire still roaring.

“Do it now,” Rich whispered.

Michael stood up, took the deepest breath he could, and screamed, “FIRE!”

Right on cue, Christine screamed.

The party erupted into chaos. Doors began opening and closing, drunk teenage girls yowling into the night, and they immediately began hearing people thump against the door to the kitchen. Jake’s voice was unmistakable, screaming Rich’s name.

Rich took a deep breath and Michael watched in amazement as he smirked and crouched, a runner at the starting line. He wasn’t scared. The worst had already happened to him. This was just cleaning up.

He looked backwards at the two of them. “It’ll be a few seconds before they try the back door to the kitchen. The door at the far end,” he pointed to the corner of the kitchen, where a happy welcome mat was set out with a coat hook next to it, “leads out into the yard. You two should run right now.”

“We aren’t leaving you,” Christine said stubbornly.

When Rich looked at her the expression on his face was so alien to his features Michael could barely describe it, but it softened into something far more tender than Michael could ever understand. “Thank you.”

Then he stood up and threw the cup of water across the room into the fire.

First all of the air was sucked out of Michael’s lungs. Then it exploded.

It was a starburst of light, color and sound, a supernova over a stove. It screamed a lion’s roar and leapt to the vaulted ceilings, pressing up against the roof like a monster straining against its cage, and it billowed out along the ceiling in lava colored mushroom clouds. The monstrous clouds ate up the ceiling like it was nothing and pushed against the door, which immediately and with a sickening crack caught on fire.

Michael screamed like he didn’t know he could scream. Christine’s scream hurt his heart, shrill and frightened, and he barely remembered to throw his jacket over his mouth and hold it there with his elbow. He grabbed Christine by the hand as the ran as fast as they could while still squatting on the ground. The fire was loud, too loud, and the roar had popped his ear drums so even as everything was loud his ears were ringing and muffling the sound. He knew that there was screaming beyond the kitchen on fire but he could not hear it. His vision had tunneled into the cheery backyard door with the welcome mat in front of it, and it was barely a few steps away but felt like a mile.

He only just remembered to wrap his hand in his jacket, gasping and coughing as soot entered his lungs, and he ripped the door open as he and Christine tumbled out. They collapsed on the grass, the heels of their hands digging in painfully into the hard dirt, but in the next second they had pulled themselves up again and had continued running, running the mile to the front of the house, running the marathon away from the house that they were rapidly beginning to understand was on fire.

He hoped Rich had made it out. It would have ruined the goal, defeated the point, but Michael didn’t care about that right now. He hoped Rich had made it out because Rich was brave and he was a lunatic and his eyes softened when he looked at Christine. He knew on an intrinsic level that Rich had sacrificed himself for them, and knowing that was a feeling indescribable. A grief so large it ate his heart.

They found the screams before they found the front of the house, teenagers collapsed on the front lawn as their friends pulled them up. High heels lay discarded as their owners ran across the street, barefoot against the cool concrete, and Michael caught sight of them disappearing into the darkness of the house across the street from them, banging on the front door and crying. Neighbors were running outside of their houses, already on the phone for 911 and running away as quickly as the teenagers were.

When Michael looked in front of him fire was spurting out the windows, smoke pouring and pouring in thick mushroom clouds with it. It wouldn’t stop. It was endless and it was as if the fire would rage forever, never burning up the house, a horrible monster that he had created. He coughed on the soot, eyes burning and lungs stinging, and he heard Christine hacking up coughs next to them.

When Michael looked backwards he saw Chloe standing there, screaming with her eyes wild and reflecting the fire. The orange glow against the dark night set her in a soft and strange tint, dappling her slinky black dress. She was a tightly coiled wire but she wasn’t screaming in fear. She was screaming for Brooke.

She rounded on Michael and Christine when she saw them. “Thank fuck you two are here! Have you seen Brooke? Where’s Brooke?”

Michael faltered. They hadn’t seen anybody, too busy at ground zero. “No, I - no.”

“Fuck.” Chloe said it with finality, turning around to look at the house. Her fists clenched and a dangerous gleam entered her eye, not so much a runner at a marathon as a boxer before a match. “She’s still in there. I’m going back in.”

She immediately made a grab for Michael’s jacket, and he was so shocked that he let her take it. She tied it around her face with quick, professional knots, even as Christine gasped. Before Michael could think too deeply about he it began kicking off his shoes.

“You can’t! Chloe, you won’t make it in time!”

“Fuck that and fuck this fire.” She bent down, shucked her high heels, and jammed on his shoes. They fit, more or less. “Jake ran in. He saw the fire and the second he got me out he turned around to find Rich. I have to go get them and Brooke.”

The hot waves of heat sunk into Michael’s undershirt and into his heart, humming along at a hummingbird rhythm, too scared to be anything but clear headed. Jake had gone back in to save the boy who was practically committing suicide.

Because he loved him.

“Wait for the fire brigade!” Christine cried, clutching at Chloe’s arm. She shook her off. “Chloe, please!”

“I don’t have time for second guesses.”

Chloe ran in back into the house in borrowed sneakers and a borrowed jacket and Michael couldn’t do anything but watch her go.

He stood there, stock still in terror, watching the flames leap higher and higher. He looked around dumbly for Jeremy, knowing he wouldn’t find him. There was no way on Earth Jeremy had gotten caught by the fire. He wouldn’t have gone back in for anybody.

Would he have gone back in for Michael?

Christine was tugging at his hand, and when he looked back her face was sweaty and shiny. “We have to go! Michael, we have to go!”

“But Rich…”

“He’ll be okay!” Christine yelled over the roar of the flames. “Michael, everything will be okay! Now we have to go!”

How could she say that, at a time like this? Did she believe it, even now, even after everything that’s happened? In what universe were things okay?

Jake’s house went up in flames and Michael’s normal life went with it.

He was just about to turn tail and run when he heard a horrible crash.

He and Christine watched in horror as they saw Jake, of all people, jump out a window on the second story, carrying a dark figure slung fireman style over his shoulder. He floated in the air for what felt like one second, two, and then he hit the ground with a thump and a sickening crack.

The landing was off to the side of the building, just visible around the east side and even through their fear Michael and Christine didn’t hesitate before they ran towards him.

They were both passed out. Christine bit into her hand and screamed when she saw Jake’s legs, bent at a grotesquely unnatural angle, and Michael felt sick. He had to force himself not to look away, as if by not looking it would magically get better, but in the next second he forced himself to get over it.

Then he looked at Rich.

He threw up again, only dry heaving this time, and Christine screamed. They heard the sound of fire engines in the distance, fucking finally, growing closer and closer, and Michael knew that they couldn’t do anything.

They heard a thump at the window, then another one, and when Michael looked up to his immense shock he saw the dark silhouette of Chloe and Brooke against the smoky glass. Christine jumped up and immediately wrapped Michael’s shirt over her hands, frantically searching for a way to open the window.

She didn’t find one. Chloe was beating at the window and Christine motioned at her to step back. She calmly wrapped Michael’s jacket around her elbow, reared her arm back, and smashed the window.

The crash of the window was so similar to the window Jake had just jumped out of that it almost made Michael sick again, but when Christine started helping a wheezing Chloe climb out of it he jumped to help a very dizzy Brooke out too. They were both caked in soot and were coughing up their lungs.

When they both saw Rich and Jake Brooke screamed and Chloe’s hands flew to her mouth. She reached over and brought Brooke’s head into her shoulder, who had started sobbing hysterically.

“It’ll be okay,” Chloe said numbly. “Things are going to be fine.”

They stood together, holding vigil over their friends passed out on the ground, and waited for the firemen and the paramedics to come and take them away.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> rich set a FIRE and he BURNED DOWN the HOUSE (whoa - ah!)


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last monster chapter before epilogue. It's been wild, guys.

  


Michael’s mother had, of course, killed him.

She cried a lot first. Michael had been pretty sure that she was going to drown him with her tears out of spite. Then she had hugged him, a lot. Then she had raged for twenty minutes about how she had wanted him to go outside and hang out with his stupid friends and what a horrible mother she was.

Then she sat Michael down on the couch and lectured him for literally an hour on having irresponsible friends and going to irresponsible parties where the partygoers decided to pour water on a grease fire and almost die. She then lectured him about making friends who were stupid enough to almost kill him. Then she cried a lot more.

Michael couldn’t help it. He sat on the couch, letting himself be lectured until she had finally worn herself down and sat next to him. His mother sighed and gave him a tight hug.

“I’m so sorry, honey.”

“It’s okay,” Michael said, before bursting into tears.

Rich was stable, at least according to Brooke and Chloe. They had gone home to a similar reception from their parents, as did Christine, but none of them knew if Jake’s parents were going to come back to visit him. Probably not. Nobody knew anything about Rich’s family, despite his famously open big mouth, but whoever they were Michael suspected that they weren’t about to show up to the hospital either.

Really, even Michael didn’t want to be at the hospital. The last time he was there he had a killer flu, and that wasn’t exactly his most fun memory. It looked different than it had in his memory, a different dimension as the visitor than it did as a patient. It felt a little smaller, but that could have just him being older. The waiting rooms were the similar soft pastel colors and scratchy couches, the same light stench of antiseptic, the constant buzz of human scrubs with beepers and clip boards attached, the same walking white coats. Sometimes they were running somewhere. Everyone seemed a little frazzled except for the receptionist lady, who watched a guy be wheeled down the hall next to her screaming and just popped her gum. Michael appreciated that in a woman.

It was a painstaking process actually finding where the two boys were, and Michael and Christine were sent in several dizzying directions. There were volunteers there to help them out, smiling old men who liked to talk to them a lot and talk about the beauty of interracial relationships as Michael and Christine smiled and felt supremely uncomfortable.  By the time they found Jake’s room Christine was yawning and rubbing her eyes, thick bags pillowing the bottoms, and if she was anything like Michael then she hadn’t slept a lot last night either.

They had both had their parents drop them off at the hospital to save the parking headache, and they had caught up together in the waiting room where Michael had been waiting, digging into feel good fanfiction as escapism. By the time Christine had found him Stormer and Kimber had almost begun confessing their love for each other, but when he saw the look on her face he clicked the phone off and stood up. They hadn’t talked too much, even though there was so much to say. It was early in the day, as early as they physically could get up, and Christine was still spitting delicate little coughs. Michael stopped to buy her a bottle of water from a vending machine, and she nodded silently in thanks.

“We should make a plan,” Michael said weakly.

But Christine just shook her head. “Not now,” she said, exhausted beyond her lack of sleep. “Please, not now.”

They found Jake and Rich’s room in silence.

The rooms were right next to each other, which was strangely sweet. Michael glanced down at the instructions the pointedly unracist old man gave them and the room numbers, and he forced himself to accept that he would have to go into one. Some part of him expected to see Jake’s mangled legs still in there, the same as they were on the browning grass outside Jake’s house. He forced himself to accept that Rich’s burns would be covered by bandages instead of being left to rot in the open air. Chloe had said in a shaking voice over the phone that Rich would be okay and would make a full recovery, that the third degree burns were only over a small part of his body so they would be alright, the second degrees were bigger but not too bad....

Michael’s fault. It was all Michael’s fault.

As if she could hear his thoughts, Christine pinched his elbow hard. Christine set her jaw and walked past him to slip into Jake’s room, almost as if she wasn’t scared at all.

The room was warm and as cheery as it possibly could get, with funky looking machines along a wall and stuff like plastic tables or a small closet along the other wall. Michael belatedly realized that he had forgotten to get Jake something. Christine, yet again reading his mind, withdrew a small envelope from her tote bag.

Jake was awake, lighting up when he saw the two of them, and Michael couldn’t help but think that he looked a little ridiculous. He had giant gauze bandages wrapped around both legs, in weird boxy shapes so they covered his splints, and both legs had weird bigger boot things, like the regular ones people wore after they lost their cast except way fancier and bigger. He wasn’t exactly hooked up to life support or anything, although there were some softly humming machines beeping along behind him, but his surprisingly serene grin caught Michael’s attention more than anything else.

Chloe and Brooke were pulled up on chairs next to him, sitting as close together as possible. Brooke didn’t look very good, with her own bandages down her arms, and Chloe looked dead on her feet, but they looked up and smiled at Michael and Christine anyway.

“The gang’s all here,” Jake said lightly. The early morning sun was filtered through the thick windowpanes, making it impossible to forget that they were inside a building, but Jake’s persistent good humor survived even here. “I’m glad you two are okay.”

“So am I,” Christine said lowly, and before Michael knew it she had ran forward and captured Jake in a tight hug. She squeezed with her impressive strength and Jake wheezed. “I’m so sorry this is all my fault oh my god I can’t believe this and your legs are broken and everything’s wrong and there are robots now and your legs are broken and oh my god Rich -”

“Hey, hey, it’s okay.” Jake gently disentangled her, and she was still sniffling even afterwards. Michael had to admire her. She was one of the bravest, most decisive people he knew, but she still let herself cry when she needed to. Michael was afraid that if he broke his tough guy facade for even a second he would break. Well, so much as he was a tough guy. He wasn’t. “Everything’s chill, Chris. I’m okay, I got these sick casts, and Rich’s fine. Kinda. Well, he’s basically fine.”

“As fine as Rich could ever be,” Chloe said darkly. She sniffed, coughing a little, and she squeezed Brooke’s hand. She shot a glance at Michael. “How did you two get out? Jenna said that she saw you at ground zero in the kitchen with Rich.”

“I’m just glad you’re okay,” Brooke said miserably. “I was so worried about you all. Like, even Michael?”

“Michael’s in with us now,” Chloe said decisively, and she carefully stood up, wincing as her asleep legs started tingling. “You got that? If it wasn’t for you I wouldn’t have…” she faltered, looking down at Brooke. Brooke squeezed her hand and smiled weakly. Chloe took a deep breath, visibly summoning her courage. “Guys, when I knew that Brooke was still in there, it was like I was still inside that awful house. Michael didn’t even hesitate before helping me. And all I could think about was the fact that I never told her…”

Chloe dropped her head, burying her face in her hands, and Brooke pulled her into a tight hug.

Brooke’s hair was messy and her sweater was half-singed, but she was smiling gently. “Guys, Chloe and I had a really long talk last night. It’s dumb, but despite all of this horrible stuff I’m really happy. I just wanted to tell that Chloe and I…”

“Yeah,” Jake said, “duh.”

“I’m so happy I could die,” Christine said flatly.

Michael could only smile, sticking his hands in his pockets. “Told you.”

Despite themselves they all laughed, and for a brief second nothing was wrong. But then they remembered that they were in a hospital, which was hard to forget, and that Jake was still bedridden. They sobered quickly, and Christine clenched her envelope as deeply as she could without creasing it.

“Michael and I tried to stop him,” Christine said. It was a white lie. “But he knew exactly what he was doing. He told us to run before he did it. I tried to get him to come with us, but…” Christine shook her head. “Michael was the one who got me out of there. He tried to stop Rich, but...you know Rich.”

They did, in fact, know Rich. The room fell into sober silence, but Christine’s slight twist of the truth worked. Jake beckoned Michael forward, and he clasped Michael’s hand in a thick and painful grip.

“Thanks, man,” Jake said. “You’re the one who warned us and you helped save Christine. Chloe’s right. You’re good with us.”

“Anyone who has a problem can set themselves on fire instead,” Brooke said blankly, like she was ordering corn nuts at the corner store.

It was weirdly touching. Michael cleared his throat, eyes stinging despite himself, and for the millionth time asked himself how things had gotten to that point.

No. No, no more of that. His old life had burned up. He shouldn’t second guess his new one. He was just to appreciate it for now, while he still could.

“Thanks, guys,” Michael said thickly. He and Christine met each other’s eyes for a long moment, and when Michael saw that they were the kind of friends who could say volumes with a single glance he got choked up all over again. They nodded at each other in complete agreement. Michael took in a deep, sucking breath. “Christine and I have something to tell you all.”

“We’ve been hiding something,” Christine said softly. She was wringing her hands on her denim dress, and Michael caught them and squeezed them. She smiled thankfully up at him. “We wouldn’t have done it if we didn’t have to. It’s really, really important.”

Chloe wasted absolutely no time. She pointed another imperious finger at them crowing in triumph. “I knew there was no fucking way Michael was bisexual!”

Brooke silently pulled out her wallet and passed Jake a twenty.

“I trusted you,” Brooke whispered. “You betrayed me.”

“You bet on whether or not Christine was a beard?” Michael asked incredulously.

“No, I bet on when you would admit it. I pegged you for at least a couple more months.”

“It’s not that Christine’s a beard!” Michael said loudly. He faltered. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, she totally is.”

“Michael is gayer than a fruitcake,” Christine said.

Thanks. “But we wouldn’t have done it if we didn’t have a good reason,” Michael said firmly. “This is...we’re taking a big risk by telling you guys this.”

“But things have sped up so fast,” Christine said, “I think we need all of the people on our team we can get. We’ve confirmed your safety. Guys, we have something really crazy to tell you.”

Michael took a deep breath to calm his racing heart. The other kids were gaping at him, Chloe in front of Brooke next to Jake, and these three gigantic morons who loved each other and called him their friend would have to be enough.

“Chloe, I’m going to need to call in that favor.”

She blinked at him. “What favor?”

“The one where you believe me.”

Michael withdrew his tape recorder from his pocket. After he realized that the monster had been a robot he had dumped all of their incriminating information onto a USB drive and put the taped message into an actual cassette. No chances.

Silently, at the same time Christine started dumping her tote bag on Jake’s bed. The photocopied yearbook pages, their transcribed notes, their lists of victims, everything. The last thing she did was open the envelope she had brought. She walked over to Jake’s bread and spread Tyler’s pictures on the sheets, and Michael watched Jake pick up one of the pictures and squint at it. He saw the slow realization dawn across his face.

Michael pressed play.

  
  
  
  


By the time the recording of Rich’s testimonial had ended Michael had shown them the freshman year pictures, some incriminating pages from the photocopied yearbook, the story as Christine knew it, the story of how Michael knew there was something wrong in the first place, and their own quiet desperation. The cool kids absorbed the information less than silently, shouting and arguing and bitterly looking away. Jake couldn’t stop looking at the picture in his hands, marvelling at it.

“I don’t believe this,” Chloe said, for the tenth time in the last hour. “I just don’t. This is crazy, you two are crazy, everyone’s freaking crazy.” She was pacing the floor, chewing at a finely laquered nail. “Brainwashing nanotechnology robots, are you seriously kidding me? Why the hell would the brainwashing quantum nanotechnology robot from Japan infest us? Everybody knows the quantum nanotechnology robot research isn’t distributed outside of state borders!”

“Really?” Michael asked flatly. “That’s your problem? Patent laws?”

“It’s a major fucking problem!” Chloe whirled around on her heel. “Sorry, Michael, but I take it back and you’re crazy again. All of you are crazy. Rich is - sorry, Jake, but Rich is sick in the head.” Jake nodded. It was fair. “Him rambling on about quantum conspiracies is just him going loco again. I once caught him trying to sell the Ponzi bridge to a freshman.”

But Brooke was staring at the binder that held the yearbook pages in her hands, running her finger over one of the pictures. Michael knew it was Jeremy’s. “Chloe,” she said softly, and Chloe immediately cut herself off. “You know how you’re perfect and great and beautiful and a good kisser, right?”

Chloe flushed, running her fingers through her hair. “Like, duh.”

“You’re, like, human perfection.” Despite the strong words her tone was quiet, and she hadn’t looked up from the binder. “Except not really. You’re a total jerk all the time. Your hair is not flawless every single day. Your mom’s kinda...well, she’s your mom. There was that one time in seventh grade that we don’t talk about.” She smiled gently before looking up, eyes blazing. “Have you ever seen Jeremy even have a bad hair day!”

Chloe was silent.

Her face was flushed too, and Michael couldn’t tear his eyes away from the singe in her sweater, but she barrelled on. “He’s never misspoke or stuttered or gotten a bad grade on a test. It’s - it’s unattainable. Being popular is lots of hard work, especially for me, but for Jeremy’s it’s like breathing.” She sucked in a deep breath before busting out, “Chloe, I’m not like you guys. I’m dumb and I miss stuff a lot and I can’t always be as great as you are. I’m sorry, Chloe, but I keep on trying to be like you and I just can’t. I don’t want to be like you. I want to be your girlfriend!”

She looked down at her hands. “There’s nobody like anybody else in this world. We can try to be picture perfect people all we want, but we’re still going to be gay and have bad hair days or whatever. If we were all just like each other I’d be bored all the time because I’d have nobody to fight with about the best movies for Girl’s Night.” She clenched her hands, letting her hair fall over her face. “When I saw that you had come to save me when I was hiding under that table I - I felt things I didn’t even know I could feel. You were, like, on fire and stuff? But you were so pretty.”

Chloe’s face was red and blotchy and she was sniffling, an ignoble look that was out of place on her foundation and strong eyebrow game, but she leaned forward to give Brooke a tight hug anyway. It sent something warm into Michael’s heart, and he saw Jake look down at the photograph in his hands. Maybe something good had come out of this.

“I don’t want to be perfect,” Chloe said into Brooke’s shoulders. “I don’t want to have perfect hair and not be gay like Jeremy. I want to be with you.”

“Uh,” Michael said, “about that.”

He may have omitted one little thing.

Before he could say anything more Christine shushed him, walking to the door and pressing her ear up against it. The others stood stock still, staring at each other with wide eyes. Christine pressed a hand to her mouth.

“Someone’s running down the halls.”

“It’s a hospital,” Jake offered weakly, “people do that all the time, right?”

Somebody knocked at the door, three perfectly timed raps.

Michael immediately dove to shove the binder, the papers, and the records inside Christine’s bag. The others saw what he was doing and rushed to help, the papers crumpling as they were shoved into each other, and they shoved it under the bed in lightning speed.

“Jake? Are you awake?”

They looked around at each other completely panicked as they realized that a single bag under the raised bed was really freaking suspicious, and Christine had to settle for clutching it to her chest like a live bomb.

Chloe dove to open the door before the speaker could knock anymore, and she pulled it open just as Jeremy’s fist hung in the air.

He was dressed in his usual casual weekend wear, relaxed fit jeans with blue button up flannel, and even though his hair was perfect there was something in wild disarray in his eyes. If Jeremy Heere was the type to feel those kinds of emotions, Michael would have said that he looked panicked.

They stared at each other.

Then Christine muscled him aside, giving her best somber yet excited smile. “Jeremy, hi! You didn’t say you were coming at all whatsoever.”

But Jeremy didn’t answer her, barely even looked at her. He was staring straight past her into Michael’s terrified eyes.

Without another word he dodged Christine and made straight for Michael, and Michael fought to keep himself from stepping back, looking for another pill nestled in the folds of his palm, when Jeremy -

Crushed Michael into a tight hug. Michael squeaked a little, instinctively returning it, and he felt Jeremy’s hot breath on his neck and the brush of his hair against the side of Michael’s face. It was a warm, inviting presence, safe as long as they were together. Except that had never been true, not really.

Jeremy pulled himself away first, frantically looking Michael up and down as if his foot was mysteriously and subtly broken. “Are you okay? Jesus, Michael, you scared me to death. Jenna said that the house caught on fire after I left, and I immediately texted Rich asking what he did this time, but then Yolanda said that Rich was in the hospital and Hannah told Monica who told Henry who told Kyle to tell me that Jake had broken both of his legs saving Rich from the fire. I would have texted you but I didn’t know how you’d respond, and the minute I heard I came straight here, but - Michael!”

He hugged him again and Michael let him, squeezing his eyes tight to stop the tears. This was the real Jeremy right here, and Michael had to fight to remember that.

“I’m okay,” Michael said softly. “We’re all a little singed but we’re fine. Rich is...Rich is going to be fine too.”

“I freaking told him, next time he tries to commit -” Jeremy stopped himself short, releasing himself again in order to look around the room. Everybody was gaping at them. Michael blushed bright red.

Jeremy was lost. Michael could see it in his face - how to recover from this, how to wrangle out the damage control. It would look defensive if he outright pushed Michael away but he couldn’t keep going on about how worried he was, and on and on. It had to be exhausting. No wonder it was the SQUIP that figured all these things out for him, it was too complicated otherwise.

“Uh.” Jeremy looked around again, taking in Brooke and Chloe’s interlocked hands and Christine and Jake’s silent stares. “Hi, guys. What’s...up?”

“Not much,” Jake said faintly. “Still in the hospital, you know.”

“As you do,” Christine said, and as usual she was keeping it up way better than they were. “Jeremy, Jake said that he really wants one of those giant cinnamon rolls from the vending machines, could you go grab one for us?”

“Sure, in a second,” Jeremy said, distracted. He stepped away from Michael, and Michael could see how hard he struggled to paste a distant but affectionate smile on his face. He clapped Michael on the shoulder, way more masculine this time. “I’m really glad you’re okay, dude. I feel like we kind of bonded at that party, you know? I’m sorry I had to go so soon.” He stuck out a hand, and Michael stared down at it in shock. “I know we haven’t really given you the warmest welcome, which kind of sucks. I just wanted to say that I think you’re in with us now. We’d love to have you in the ‘in group’. Trust me, it’s a great place to be.” He looked around at the room, completely failing to read the mounting tension. “Guys, what do you say?”

It was their cue. This was where Brooke and Christine shrugged and went along with whatever he said, when Jake followed Rich who always complained but always followed anyway, when Chloe raised a stink but always agreed in the end. This was when Rich would say something awful and vaguely intimidating, and he would have if he was in the room. But he was lying on a hospital bed instead with second and third degree burns, still comatose.

The room looked at each other, the old friends making their decisions together in a snap gesture when Chloe shook her head. Michael’s heartbeat was loud in his ears, and he only had eyes for an distantly affectionate Jeremy. “You hate Michael.”

Jeremy’s smile froze on his face. “No I don’t.”

“You laughed when Rich bounced Tim Long’s head on a sink,” Brooke said quietly. She squeezed Chloe’s hand as if she was trying to make sure it was still there. “You said that he deserved just because he was a fag.”

“You’re blowing that out of proportion,” Jeremy said, annoyed. “Tim Long was an asshole. It’s just a word, it doesn’t mean anything. Besides, I didn’t see you two running up to stop him either.”

“No,” Jake said, “I guess we didn’t.”

“Exactly.” Jeremy rolled his eyes and grabbed Michael’s hand, giving it a good shake. “Don’t worry, Mike, usually we aren’t squabbling like this. Tensions are just high because of Rich. You guys are being such downers.” He looked around, framing his voice into something encouraging. “You look like sad sacks right now. Rich is going to be fine, guy’s a damn rubber ball. He’s going to be jumping somersaults by the time the week’s out.”

Strangely enough, it didn’t seem to encourage them. The idea of the same monster that made Rich set the house on fire in the first place trying urging them to stop being sad about him just made the whole thing more sour. Michael pulled his hand away.

“I don’t want to be in the in crowd,” Michael said quietly. “I just want to be your friend.”

Jeremy blinked at him, thoroughly confused. “I’m sorry, what did you say? You don’t have to worry, Michael. Everybody in the in crowd’s my friend. I have tons of friends.” He looked around the room, at the somber and increasingly creeped out group of popular kids. He propped his hands on his hips. “Skulking around like this is not going to look very good for our image, guys. Chloe, why haven’t you been exaggerating the story with Jenna? She’s wondering where you are.”

“Don’t really care about Jenna right now,” Chloe said woodenly.

“That’s weird, because Jenna sure cares about you,” Jeremy said. He didn’t snap. So long as they were in public Jeremy wasn’t that capable of it. “You can’t let her down like this. Guys, it’s literally just Rich. I catch him hitting his head against rocks because he’s bored. We can’t just sulk in a hospital room forever.” He paused, apparently realizing for the first time that Jake, who had broken both of his legs saving Rich’s life, was lying there. “Uh, no offence.”

The girls looked shaken. Brooke squeezed Chloe’s hand tightly. “He’s your best friend.”

“What, are you saying I don’t care about him? Of course I care about him. Me and Rich are tight. Yeah, we’re real tight. He wouldn’t want us to sit around crying all the time.” There was an almost imperceptible shake in Jeremy’s hands. “Honestly, the guy’s a psycho. Again, no offense, but he pulls shit like this all the time. This little stunt of his was not the first time and it’s not the last time. At this point he’s just doing it for the attention. We shouldn’t indulge this stupid, self-destructive sort of behavior -”

“Jeremy,” Christine said softly, “you’re crying.”

So he was. It was clear that Jeremy hadn’t noticed. Michael himself had barely noticed. His speech hadn’t halted, he never faltered in his increasingly frantic pep talk, but silent tears were running down his face as if they weren’t even there. If you hadn’t even seen the tears you would have never known that he was crying.

He was shocked, swiping at his cheek and blinking when he saw that it was wet. He looked around the room, lost and confused, looking for their characteristic dismissal but finding only pity. “No I’m not,” he said stupidly. He looked at the tears on his hands with fascination. “I haven’t cried in years. That’s weird.”

Michael had a lot of resolutions, but they had never held up to Jeremy.

Hatred, integrity, a superior attitude. None of them had ever held up to him. He was a double feint, a one two punch, a shadow on the other side of the mountain. Just as Michael would brace himself for one side of him he would be faced with the other and he would hesitate. Jeremy caught him off guard every time. He was always vulnerable.

Michael never wanted to talk to him again.

So he gently looped his arm around Jeremy’s shoulders, giving him a tight squeeze. “Let’s go get Jake’s cinnamon roll,” he said lightly. “I could seriously stuff five Twinkies in my mouth right now.”

He half-expected Jeremy roll him off and toss his head like a proud horse, but instead he smiled weakly. “Hot.”

They smiled at each other. Brooke, Chloe, and Jake’s minds quietly exploded from behind them.

Michael put his hand on his back as they left the room, letting it slip off as they walked down the hall. He tried his best to keep an eye on the signs and room numbers, knowing that it would be royally embarrassing if they got lost now of all times, in such a serious situation.

Then he remembered that Jeremy had a robot in his brain and that there was no way he was going to forget something as simple as a room number.

That 4.0 made so much sense now. So many things made sense now, things that Michael hadn’t really wanted to know the answer to. Things that he thought he wanted to know but would have been better off not knowing.

As he predicted, Jeremy knew exactly where the vending machine was. Jeremy crouched in front of it, squinting as he silently traced his finger to find the right button on the selection screen, and Michael’s phone buzzed in his pocket.

He clicked it open to find a new text message.

 **Christine Canigula:** Be careful.

He stuffed the phone back in his pocket as Jeremy turned around, casually picking his wallet out of his jeans.

“Do you want anything?” He withdrew his debit card and held it up to the sensor on the vending machine. He spoke clearly into the speaker, “Cinnamon Roll”.

The little claw platform picked it up and gently moved it down and Michael numbly watched the little LED lights flash a cheery bright blue as Jeremy grabbed the roll.

He grinned at Michael, winking. “Do you wanna see something cool?”

Michael’s throat was dry. He really, really didn’t. “Sure,” he said weakly.

Jeremy beckoned him over and, instead of holding his debit card up to the sensor, put his palm on it instead. With his other fingernail he scraped the bottom of the sensor.

“If you mess with the heat sensor here, and you hit this flaw in the payment mechanism, you can do...this!”

The machine beeped, as if his debit card had actually gone through, and Jeremy grinned and swiped his finger down the selection screen.

The claw platform worked overtime, accepting the candy and gum and Twinkies shoved into it as it dumped them into the open slot at the bottom. The snack food stacked up at the bottom and Jeremy began grabbing them and putting them in his pockets.

“Pretty cool, huh? They don’t teach you that in Programming class!”

“I’m pretty sure that’s not where you learned that,” Michael said weakly.

They just had to be fighting robots.

With the covertness born of years of playing Tetris in class Michael withdrew his phone and texted practically from his pocket to Christine.

 **Michael Mell:** dont text this number anymore

Maybe he could get a burner phone. That might work.

He got no response from Christine, which was what he had hoped for. She was smart enough that she would have caught on immediately, and was probably giving the same instructions to the others. That would have to be a harder sell.

Jeremy had begun breaking into the Cool Ranch Fritos, ripping it open with his teeth as he stuffed a Mountain Dew into his pocket. He casually handed a Mars Bar and Barbeque M&Ms to Michael for him to stuff in his jacket pockets.

He was even chatting. Jeremy wasn’t much of a chatter. “Since I’m going to be helping with that bake sale tomorrow with the NHS I’m not going to have a lot of free time for the next couple of days, but now that you’re actually tight with us I think we can really be friends now. Wouldn’t that be cool? Maybe I can even start changing my mind about fags - sorry, I mean gay people. I’m going to have to start making that switch. You guys looked tight back there, and don’t think I haven’t noticed that you have all been hanging out more. I notice a lot. What were you talking about?”

“It’s okay, man,” Michael said. “They’re gone.”

They weren’t entirely without an audience, of course, but the thought of that horrible thing actually listening in made Michael’s skin crawl. He couldn’t avoid it. He had to look it in the face and continue anyway, because it was Jeremy’s face.

“Yeah, they’re back in the room.” He shoved some Fritos into his mouth, grimacing as the flavor dust went everywhere. “You have been spending a lot of time with Chloe and Brooke lately. Don’t tell me you’re going to sleep with them too.”

There was a hospital room right next to the vending machines, Room 2001, and on impulse Michael tried the doorknob and saw that it was unlocked. He opened it, ignoring Jeremy’s surprised grunt, and when he saw that nobody was inside he pulled Jeremy in.

“Dude,” Michael said. “They’re gone.”

Jeremy looked around, carefully folding up his chip bag and storing it back in his pocket. “This is kind of a bad time to be making out, but if it’ll make you feel better I can go for it.”

“Jeremy,” Michael said softly, “it’s okay to be sad.”

“I’m not sad,” Jeremy said stiffly.

“He’s your best friend.”

“I was way more torn up about it when he swallowed half a bottle of sleeping pills the first time,” Jeremy snapped. “He’s just doing it for attention, Michael. I’m not going to indulge him by crying about it.”

“I’m sorry your best friend’s suicidal,” Michael said. “I’m sorry you think that he doesn’t care enough about you to stay.”

Jeremy broke down.

Michael held him as he sobbed, dry and heaving breaths as he found tears from a long dried well. Jeremy didn’t try to say anything and Michael didn’t either, letting him gasp out hyperventilating breaths. Michael held him as tight as he could and forced himself not to think about the voyeuristic robot. It couldn’t just be him and Jeremy, no matter how much he wanted it to be, but for that second he knew Jeremy was the only one crying.  

It felt like they stayed that way for ages and no time at all, and Michael listened to his breaths slow down and for his chest to stop wracking. His mom had held him like this yesterday. Jeremy’s mom wasn’t about to.

Finally, Jeremy broke apart only to kiss him again, long and slow and a little wet with tears, and Michael let him. They stood together, Jeremy’s forehead on his, and Jeremy laughed.

“There’s a bed right there if you really want to go for it.”

Michael smacked him on the chest, and he laughed. “You only have one thing on your mind today, don’t you?” Michael said, before pausing. “You don’t have to save face. I totally cried about this yesterday to my mom, no judgement here.”

“Your mom’s scary,” The guy possessed by an evil robot said flatly. “Does this mean you’re not mad at me anymore? You’re always getting mad at me and I don’t know why.”

Yeah, because Jeremy didn’t understand that close relationships did not feature endless criticism. Michael was beginning to gain an impression of his robot through the negative space it left behind and it seriously wasn’t looking pretty. “I was pretty mad at you,” Michael said, “and Jeremy, I tried telling you why it was wrong and you didn’t understand. Your intentions might have been good but it’s not nice to say those things to people.”

“Oh.” Jeremy furrowed his brow, concentrating like a normal person on an AP Calculus test. Not concentrating like Jeremy did on an AP Calculus test. They bored him. Everything bored him. “I was just trying to help.”

“I don’t need that kind of help.”

Jeremy stared at him blankly, lips silently moving as he tried to process the thought.

Then he surged forwards and kissed him again, this time a bit too roughly, and Michael was forced to try and push him off. “Hey, a little warning here!”

“Sorry!” Jeremy was smiling again, eyes bright but red rimmed, and Michael’s ‘Scary Jeremy O’ Meter’ began to tick upwards. “Michael, you’re so amazing, you know that?”

“I am?”

“You’re just - I didn’t have feelings before I met you! I barely even remembered what they were like, what anything other than - than hatred or boredom or resentment was. Then I caught you listening in on me, and we were so worried that you were going to spill something that we agreed to work with you on the project. A lot changed for me. I resented it like hell, but something inside me did change.”

Michael’s breath was caught. Was he saying…? A hospital room was the worst place ever to say this. It should be more romantic or something, like a candlelit dinner, or literally anywhere that did not feature an evil robot.

“But it’s so weird. Because I know a lot about love. I have someone in my life who loves me very, very much.” Jeremy’s hand twitched to prove his point. “But when I look at you I don’t want to say mean things to you even if they’re true and it would be good for you. Like, when you do something stupid I don’t want to...I don’t want to do some things to you. Things that feel bad now but are good for you later. You like video games and you have those ridiculous weed socks and I really want to tell you what to like and how to behave but I don’t at the same time. Because you’re as far away from chill as you can get, but I kind of like that about you.”

Michael reached into his pocket and, by touch and muscle memory, clicked on the emergency number line on his lockscreen. He called the preprogrammed emergency number, keeping the volume to silent as Jeremy kept talking. He was looking nervous now, and Michael had the sense he would have fidgeted if he had been allowed to.

“I don’t know how I feel about you. It can’t be love, but I don’t know what else it could be.”

Someone picked up the phone and Michael hung up. His back was to the door, and Jeremy was so close to him he overtook his vision.

“You’re creeping me out again,” Michael said carefully. “Jeremy, please just back away. “

“How is me telling you that I don’t want to hurt you creeping you out?” Jeremy huffed, strangely adorably. He didn’t back away.“You’re really confusing.”

“I could say the same about you,” Michael said honestly. “Jeremy, sometimes I feel like we just don’t fit. We’re always working on different...wavelengths. I’m worried about you. I don’t know where I work into your new world order.”

“What are you saying?” Jeremy only stepped closer. His cheeks were still ruddy with tears, even as his mood had done a complete one eighty. That was Jeremy. “What do you mean, we don’t fit? Michael?”

She had to find them sometime. Michael risked a glance behind him, seeing that the door was still completely shut. If he just cracked it a little…”Maybe it’s what it sounds like.”

“Oh.” Jeremy looked down at his hands. “Okay.”

“It’s nothing on you,” Michael said hastily, despite the fact that it was entirely about him. “I’m just worried about you. Jeremy, I really, really care about you. It’s just that we were never friends before this. Maybe we can just...be friends?”

Jeremy looked at him, face blank, and Michael realized that despite sleeping his way through the cheerleader team he had never been broken up with before.

Michael was hit with a sudden wave of electric fear that Jeremy wasn’t going to let him do that. He was possessed. Michael was afraid now, his heart jumping into his throat, even when he didn’t want to be. The guy who just went on about how he was surprised that he didn’t want to knock Michael around was definitely a perfectly safe guy to break up with.

He backed up, but they were too far away from the door to subtly make for it. He hit his back against a creamy white wall, exerting all the effort he could on looking as calm as physically possible.

“Is that it?”

Michael froze, desperately pressing his ear against the wall to listen for Christine. “What do you mean?”

Jeremy wasn’t looking anything other than pleasant. He shrugged, and Michael saw his features settle into something resembling relief. Relief was probably good. “That’s a really easy fix.”

Fix.

Their conversation in the car snapped back to him. But Jeremy was already rooting around in his pocket, slipping something small into his hand. When he held it out as if in offering to him, hand stretched out as if he was inviting Michael to take his hand, Michael saw it.

That, Michael thought hysterically, was a SQUIP? An evil tic tac?

“I think we just have a communication problem,” Jeremy said casually, as if he wasn’t holding an evil supercomputer in his palm. “I guess because I’m not allowed to talk with you in public. I just think we’re always on different tabs. I know you got mad at me because you thought that  I was trying to give you drugs, but I swear that this isn’t a drug. I think it’ll help connect us.”

Michael abandoned all pretenses and made a dive for the door, but Jeremy reached out and grabbed his arm before he could escape. Michael yelled, thrashing in his grip. “Get the fuck off of me!”

“Michael, what’s wrong? Are you okay? Christ, it’s just a pill. Why are you freaking out?” Jeremy dragged Michael in a bit closer, and Michael fought his own hyperventilation. “Don’t scream! Man, I’m sounding kind of sketchy right now. Please, just hear me out.”

“You’re sounding more than a bit sketchy right now!” Michael shouted. “Let go of me!”

“See, I care about you, so I’m going to do what’s best for you. So, uh, not letting go of you. You’ll thank me later.” Michael, in fact, had absolutely no intention of thanking him later, just as he had no desire to have what was best for him done to him.

Out of his other pocket Jeremy withdrew some Mountain Dew and gave it a slight shake. The hand gripping Michael’s arm still had the pill clutched in it, and he felt it press up against his forearm.

“I’m doing you a really big favor, Michael. These things are way expensive. I get them free, of course, but still. You haven’t even heard me out on this one yet, so stop freaking out.” Jeremy had his hands full: between holding onto Michael, the pill, and the Mountain Dew, Michael could see him struggling to balance it all. He didn’t drop the Mountain Dew. Was that supposed to wash down the pill? Why Mountain Dew of all things?

“Christine!” Michael screamed, and it was only then that Jeremy dropped the soda to clap a hand over his mouth.

“Is this about her? I never should have let you keep dating her. I know you’re not actually bisexual so I don’t get why you would ditch someone who actually has sex with you for someone who doesn’t.”

Michael bit his hand, making Jeremy grunt and withdraw it. He didn’t let go of Michael’s arm, and no matter how hard he tugged his grip was iron. “Get away from me, you freak!”

When Jeremy’s face crumpled in hurt Michael even felt guilty. The guy was manhandling him and he felt guilty for hurting his feelings. That SQUIP magic was strong. Or maybe Michael was still a little infatuated. Maybe both, feeding into each other over and over again.

“Look,” Jeremy said weakly, “I have to do this.” He tugged Michael in again, even as Michael fought. “Michael, you don’t understand. It’s - it’s willing or unwilling, it’s all the same. In the end it’s always the same. I fought so hard to try and get you the easy way. I’m doing all of this for you. If you reject me now then it’s not going to be pretty later. I don’t want that to happen to you.”

Michael’s blood ran cold. They were after him. Him, specifically. They wanted him. Jeremy’s one two punch had hit again - it was easier to surrender then to be dragged in screaming, or at least he thought so. He didn’t understand why someone wouldn’t want that because he cheated on his US History exam.

“Please,” Jeremy said. “I don’t want to have to hurt you.”

The door slammed open and Christine rushed in, having finally received his emergency call and located him through the scream. Her hair was wild and she skidded to a stop when she saw the scene - Michael held by his arm, a pathetic Jeremy asking Michael not to make him hurt him. He let go of Michael the minute he saw Christine, but he couldn’t pretend he hadn’t been doing it.

When Christine screeched in anger it wasn’t faked. “What are you doing?”

“Just a fight,” Jeremy said quickly, “it just escalated, I lost my temper.”

“Why were you grabbing my boyfriend!” Christine screeched, even louder. Her face was red with anger. “What’s wrong with you!”

“I’m sorry, it’s been a tough day. Everyone’s a little on edge, right?” He turned to Michael, a quiet desperation in his eyes. “Tell her it wasn’t a big deal.”

Michael was silent. Jeremy’s face fell.

Michael shook himself off and he finally moved to follow an enraged Christine out the door. He only turned back once to look Jeremy in the eyes. Pathetic, as always.

“I’m sorry,” Michael said. “I would give anything to be friends with you.”

Jeremy twitched, eye practically screwing shut as his head ducked. When he looked up again there was something far more determined about him, a straighter posture. His hands clenched.

“I’m sorry too,” he said. “I took it so fast because actually liking you was scarier. I’ve never actually liked anyone before. I didn’t know if it would hurt or not.” He gave Michael a real smile, a small one. “It did, but that’s okay. Whatever happens, Michael, know that - know that I’m ready to care now.”

Michael had no answer to that, so he whirled away with Christine. Jeremy was left holding a cinnamon bun, a bag of Fritos, Mountain Dew, a tic tac, and nothing else.

He stopped by Rich’s room before he left. He hadn’t had the courage to do it before but there was no choice now. Whatever strength Michael had, Rich had been stronger.

Well, or more psychotic. Guy was either unbelievably brave and resilient or he was psychotic. If Michael was honest with himself it was probably the latter.

Where Jake’s room was warm and crowded with admirers and well wishes Rich’s was bare. The curtains were drawn and only one of the fluorescent lights were on at the far side of the room, and there were far, far more apparatuses crowded around the bed. Michael remembered that there were a lot of second degree burns, which would scar something nasty but wasn’t life threatening. He also had third degree burns on about five percent of his body. Third degree burns on ten percent of his body was fatal. Jake had saved his life.

Just like Chloe had saved Brooke from the fire. Just like Christine saved Michael’s skin by coming up with the fake dating plan and figuring out how to drug Rich. Michael, for all of his big talk, hadn’t saved anybody, not really. He was useless.

The figure on the bed was wrapped in heavy bandages nearly from head to toe, but his face and a little of his arms were left uncovered. There was no scarring or disfigurement on the face, thank god, but Michael could see a little poking out from under the bandages on the shoulder. He was just lying there, and he should have looked like he was asleep. You couldn’t even imagine that he was.

When Michael spotted a figure on the side of the bed he did a double take. It was a lanky, tall boy with an impressive jewfro with his knees curled to to his chest. On the nightstand was a cheap carnival tie dye bear.

He startled when he heard the sound of the door closing, and Michael smiled weakly at Tyler.

“How is he?”

Tyler shrugged uncomfortably. “He’ll be okay. He’ll wake up eventually, I mean.” He looked down at Rich again. “I didn’t miss doing this.”

There wasn’t a ton to say to that. Michael pulled up a chair next to Tyler, and they sat there watching him breathe and the machines beep around him.

“Take some time off school,” Michael said finally. “Make something up. Be here as much as possible. Just...try to stay off the radar.”

Tyler turned to look at him, eyes wide. “Is something going on? Michael, was Rich trying to stop something? What’s wrong?”

“The less you know the safer you are. Well, the safer I am.” Rich lay prone on the bed, and despite the situation Michael had to wonder how the school was flipping out over this. Maybe they were making those supportive copy pastas on Myspace. “Try and look after him. Tell me if anyone sketchy comes in here.”

Tyler nodded firmly, and Michael had the sense he was glad to have a job, to be helping somehow. He was responsible for more of this than he had known. “I’ll stay.”

Michael couldn’t bear to stay around any longer.

When he got back to Jake’s room it was obvious that they had all been talking about him, mostly because Brooke was horrified and Chloe couldn’t stop laughing.

“Were we all gay?” Brooke asked despairingly. “Did we seriously just all stay in the closet because we were afraid of what Rich would think?”

“Rich is gay too,” Michael said flatly.

Chloe laughed harder. The look on Jake’s face was pure and undiluted shock.

He pushed himself up a little higher in his bed, almost forgetting the cast. “He - gay? Bisexual? Really? Rich - he hates - Rich? Me? Rich?”

“Congrats,” Michael said dryly. “Now you have a chance.” He cleared his throat, and decided that he was going to violate Rich’s privacy. He would probably forgive him. Probably. “He loves you too. The SQUIP never let him say it.”

What passed through Jake’s face was indescribable. Michael knew how he had to have been feeling. They had wasted too much time hating each other and hating themselves and being possessed by homophobic evil robots. They should have had more time to be teenagers and date people who they actually loved.

By the time visiting hours had ended they had talked over everything they could, thrown around a million theories and ravenously combined five different stories. The full picture began to come together, a picture that Michael wasn’t necessarily a fan of.

They were so caught up in it Michael had ended up texting his mother to see if the girls could stay over at their place to work late on a school project. He made up this story about incredible procrastination and the deep seated need to help Brooke through a tragic breakup and he even included a picture of all of the girls making the V sign. They had chosen Michael’s place because nobody else’s parents would be okay with Michael staying over. Besides, everyone was morbidly fascinated with a video game collection so incredible it made Jeremy fucking Heere get a crush on him.

Michael’s mother, for her part, broke into cackles when she saw that Michael was sleeping in the same basement as three beautiful women and dragged down their camping sleeping bags. Michael’s father was clearly subtly impressed, but he made a point of showing them Michael’s first communion pictures. Chloe gleefully snapped pictures on her phone of all of them and Brooke drank his sparkling water.

None of them got a lot of sleep last night. They stayed up late, swapping stories and putting together pieces of the puzzle and confessing how scared they were. They talked a lot about quantum nanotechnology supercomputers and what exactly that even meant. Chloe did something mysterious with Michael’s computer so it was off the grid and they looked up how quantum technology supercomputers even worked. The wikipedia page was supremely unhelpful, talking about how they were in the earliest test stages, and their strongest piece of evidence was on one of those “I FUCKING ADORE THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD” Myspace pages that posted videos of somebody modding their hoverboard to go underwater or something. Michael, whose mother called hoverboards a death trap and refused to get him one, was secretly jealous.

They had fallen asleep at four am, more or less. The exhausted girls snuggled up next to each other in a frankly adorable display that Michael took several pictures of, but Michael’s anxiety kept him awake like an electric shock every few minutes. Just when he thought that he was finally going to fall asleep he woke up and he would do it all over again.

Finally, at five am, Michael crept over to a trunk at the bottom of a small closet that held most of their winter gear and thick, fluffy blankets. He found a key hidden in one of his sculptures and unlocked it, gritting his teeth as the hinges squeaked.

The trunk held more old blankets and quilts, stinking heavily of moth balls. Michael dug into the bottom of the trunk and pulled out several flasks of varying sizes. Then he pulled out a two liter bottle of Mountain Dew Red.

He stared at it, turning it around in his fingers, smelling its faintly musty odor and failing to accurately catch a glimpse of its fire engine red liquid. He turned on the flashlight app on his phone and opened it up, feeling like the was letting a monster loose. He meticulously poured some of it into a well sized flask to hide in a secret pocket in his jacket. Then he found a much smaller one and filled that up too. He silently grabbed a roll of ace bandages from the cabinet, rolled it around his hips and stuck the flask inside. He put on two undershirts, his thickest shirt, and he would put his jacket on the next day. He hid the Mountain Dew again went back to sleep.

When they woke up the next day they were all extremely late. They all chugged a terrifying amount of coffee and Michael had to wrest the Bailey’s cream and whisky away from Brooke trying to make hers an Irish Coffee. Brooke, as it turned out, was an extreme heavyweight and could drink the football team under the table. This did not excuse Irish Coffee on a school day.

Chloe and Brooke took Chloe’s car and Michael and Christine took his car. He and Christine talked about if they were still fake dating, since it wasn’t strictly necessary anymore. Now that he didn’t have to worry about the opinions of anyone they actually cared about they were trying to find the most overblown reason to break up while still making room to be very amicable exes. Michael was in favor of him just realizing that he wasn’t bisexual, as literally everybody would accept that, and Christine said it was because he had made an ultimatum about how “Hamlet goes or I go!” Hamlet was her cat. They weren’t exactly living together.

The school was empty.

Nobody was playing hacky sack next to the gates. Girls weren’t smoking in one of the alleys. Nobody was reclining on the stairs, walking from building to building or stuffing gross prepackaged breakfast muffins in their face. The popular kids weren’t lounging in front of the library and Michael wasn’t skulking in the corners by himself, playing Mario Kart 4DS and wishing that he had just one real friend.

Their ghosts walked the halls in a silent procession and Michael saw Chloe check her phone and frown. “It’s definitely Monday.”

A horrible shivering feeling was trailing down Michael’s spine to curl around his gut. Christine hovered closer to him, and Michael saw her stick her hand in her bag. Brooke and Chloe grabbed each other’s hands, Chloe pushing Brooke slightly to stand behind her.

“Maybe there’s an assembly,” Brooke offered weakly. “Or there was really bad traffic.”

It was an incredibly long shot, but Michael checked the traffic maps, the weather maps, his email for any details about the district closing, and his texts to see if Jeremy had sworn revenge yet. Nothing.

Finally, fucking finally, they saw a hunchbacked student with a giant backpack amble across the courtyard, heading for the gym. Chloe immediately called for him to stop, but he ignored her.

Nobody ignored Chloe Valentine. Nobody. Michael immediately ran forward and recognized the guy as Wilson, which his characteristic small and lanky build with a head full of grimy caramel hair. He exhaled in relief.

“Dude, where the hell is everyone? Did class start early or something?”

Wilson cocked his head and blinked at him. It was oddly reminiscent of Jeremy, early on into their relationship. The girls were running up behind him, eyes wide. “No, we’re all in the cafeteria. There’s no assembly.”

“The cafeteria?” Michael asked incredulously. “What’s going on in there?”

“There’s a bake sale.”

Everyone looked around at each other, thoroughly confused. Yeah, there was a bake sale. Jeremy had casually mentioned it a few times. He and the NHS were raising money for...something, probably for the Save The Bees, Oh God, Our Crops Are Dying, movement. Maybe something else was happening in there.

“I’m a huge cookie fan,” Christine confessed. “Want to go take a look?”

Everyone uneasily agreed. Wilson shrugged and left on his way to the front office.

Sure enough, the cafeteria was full. The lunch tables had all been set out, and kids eating their school breakfast were already chowing down. The other kids were breaking into cookies, cake pops, macarons and pies. It was a very fancy bake sale. There was a low hum of conversation around the room, talking about their homework or the new game show on Netflix Live last night.

At the front of the room was a large stretch of tables, four or five long, and Michael saw Jeremy and a few other girls from NHS manning swipe machines and twisting plastic baggies with twist ties. Teenagers waited in a neat, orderly line in front of it, pressing their cards to the machine and accepting their cookies. There was a cooler to the side of the table and the kids would grab a soda out of it on their way out.

A table in front of them noticed that they walked in, swiveling their heads to look at Michael and the girls. A single mousy freshman that Michael recognized from theater turned her head just off beat, brightening up when she saw Christine.

“Hey, boss! Man, you’re so late for school.”

“I overslept,” Christine said numbly. “What’s going on?”

The girl looked at her, confused. “A bake sale, I think?”

Before Christine could ask any more questions a tall, stout boy walked by and sat next to her, offering her a large and delicious cookie and a can of Mountain Dew. “Here you go. I got it for you.”

The girl blushed, twirling her hair around a finger. “That’s so sweet, Park. I’m on a diet, but man does that look good.”

She took a big bite out of it, then a swing of the Mountain Dew.

Michael didn’t move, didn’t blink and didn’t talk. He wrangled his screaming heart into submission and locked it into a very tight box. He subtly checked for his flask in his jacket pocket, then for the subtle one on his back. Between the bandages, the shirts, and the jackets he could barely feel it.

The girls, who didn’t know about the Mountain Dew, were confused but were steadily growing creeped out anyway.

“What’s going on?” Brooke asked loudly. “Everyone’s so quiet.”

Michael grabbed her arm, squeezing it tightly before letting go. He stuck his hands in his pockets and said in a slightly louder voice, “I guess we’re having an assembly later or some shit? Man, that cake looks awesome. You want me to buy you some chocolate, Christine?”

She giggled, twirling her hair around her finger in a match of the mousy girl. The girl has still chewing sluggishly. “You’re so sweet, Michael!”

At the table in the front Jeremy was smiling and chatting with the equally smiley and chatty masses. He started when he saw Michael, locking eye contact with him like they were the only two people in the room. Then the moment broke and he beckoned them over, letting the group skip the line to approach warily.

“I thought that you guys were skipping. Don’t worry, I would have covered for you.” He gave Michael a shy smile, ducking his head. “Friends help each other out, right?”

“Yeah,” Michael said dumbly, “right. So...what charity is this bake sale for again?”

Jeremy looked around, surprised. He leaned behind the table and checked a seat behind him. “Uh...I think it’s for the Spyware Support Network.”

“The what the what now?” Chloe asked bluntly.

Jeremy just shrugged. “You know, victims of viruses who lost their entire bitcoin savings. Not enough people buy bitcoin insurance, you know. They need our support. Which is what bake sales are for!”

“I didn’t know that was a thing,” Christine said slowly. “Even though this sale looks...pretty popular.”

“Yeah, totally. Just about everyone in the school’s gotten one. We’re almost running out!” Jeremy laughed, perfect hair gleaming in the sunlight. “Man, this gives me good memories of my old school. I used to run these things all the time at Middlebury.”

Michael’s feet froze to the floor. He fought to keep his voice steady. “Middlebury.”

“Yeah, I was the president of the NHS there.” He shrugged. “I was the one who came up with it. It really brings the community together, you know.”

A girl standing next to him with a vintage dress and curly hair offered a macaron to them. “Would you like one? It’s on the house for Jeremy’s friends.”

“We’re on a diet,” Chloe said quickly. “You know, like keto? It’s so in.”

“Millie Bobby Brown’s a real advocate for it,” Brooke said quickly. “And she’s, like, my idol? I loved her in the live action Frozen remake?”

“Indulge a little bit,” Jeremy smiled. His eyes were like marbles. “Eat one.”

“I’m not hungry,” Michael said flatly.

“Too bad,” Jeremy said. Then he shrugged, a minor inconvenience. “I did warn you.”

The cafeteria looked at them. Everybody. The entire school, all one thousand students, stood up from their tables and food and macarons and looked at them.

Michael’s heart jumped into his throat, and he and the girls slowly moved together. The other students were covering the exits. Some of them had begun walking towards the table. Jenna, Yolanda, the football team, the Yugioh club, everyone popular and unpopular and white and black and every which way it was possible to be. They moved in unison towards Michael and the girls. Jeremy smiled absently behind them as Michael’s back bumped up against the desk, sending cake slices and cookies wrapped in little plastic bags flying.

“We could have done this the easy way, Michael,” Jeremy said. “Just remember that.”

Christine dug her hand into her bag, dragging out a can of mace and - was that a tazer gun? She double wielded them as the girls pulled out their own bright pink cans of mace. Brooke actually pulled out a pink switchblade, which couldn’t have been legal. Michael, who was not a woman and had never carried around self defense memorabilia in his life, moved to hide behind them.

“Go away!” Christine screamed. “I’m armed!”

The masses did not care. They advanced closer.

Normally high schoolers clashed against each other like pinballs, creating a beautiful crowd of organized chaos just barely wrangled by teachers and the lunch bells. Everywhere from bumping into each other in the hallway to misunderstanding a friend to making an enemy, everybody clashed. When nobody really understood each other, when all anybody could ever do is try, life was an eternal battlefield where the world was split into allies and enemies with a shifting front line every day. Somewhere, in that teeming mass of people where anything could happen, a popular kid could be literally satan. Then they clashed and pinwheeled off of each other and Michael had found himself spinning adrift, with no anchor and no line to shore.

This unity should have been their shore, the kingdom built upon rock where his normal life had been built upon sand. It was a calm sea.

Underneath that calm sea a monster waited.

“We need a distraction,” Christine hissed, as the four of them moved to stand back to back. “They only have one point of attention. If we can divert it we can get out of here.”

“I’ll stay back,” Michael volunteered immediately. “I can get to Jeremy, talk sense into him -”

Chloe gently hit him on the head, making him wince. She had no makeup on, no eyeliner or strong eyebrow game. Her hair was tucked into a neat braid but she was stuck wearing sneakers liberated from Michael’s closet and sweatpants with  an oversized shirt advocating ORECreation. Brooke had refused to take off her sweater, even if it was still singed. These grimy popular girls wiedling cans of mace were scrubbed raw, and underneath Michael saw something truly terrifying.

“You’re the one with the network, the contacts, everything. You and Christine are getting out of here. We’ll cause the distraction.”

“You can’t!” Christine hissed quietly. The crowd advanced slowly. Jeremy was humming from behind them. “They’ll get you!”

Chloe smiled, and with her free hand she grabbed Brooke’s. Brooke squeezed it, hard, ducking her head so her hair fell in curtain over her face. “Haven’t you heard that I’m Chloe fucking Valentine? I’m a fucking trendsetter, not a wannabe.”

“There’s one thing they can’t take from us,” Brooke said. “You’ll go on three. Three...two…”

Brooke and Chloe stepped forward, hands interlocked. Jeremy looked at them, politely interested.

“Hey, what were you guys talking about?”

“One,” Brooke whispered.

Chloe raised her voice into a scream, echoing throughout the full cafeteria. “Listen the fuck up sheeple! Bow down to your fashion god!”

“We’re setting a new trend,” Brooke yelled. “It’s fashion forward and the newest spring style!”

The crowd’s attention focused entirely on them. Michael and Christine slipped away as best as they could, ducking into the crowd and pretending to move forward even as they moved back.

“Our anonymous public high school is queer as fuck!” Chloe screamed, “Love is love, assholes!”

Then she and Brooke met in a passionate kiss, wild and untamable like a spark caught on two colliding pieces of razor edged metal, and as the crowd surged forward and went crazy Michael and Christine made their break for it out of the back.

Michael ran faster than he ever had before, powering through the stitch in his side and his tunnel vision and his burning legs, how they wobbled and bent, he and Christine pulling each other along when they grew too tired. He sprinted across the courtyard he had walked a million times, jumped over stairs he had sat on for a thousand mornings, left the shadowy corners of friends and nerds and Mario Kart 4DS behind. He ran past the alley where Kyle had tried to beat him up and Jeremy had pretended to abandon him, he ran past an empty library where once upon a time two beautiful girls pretended to impress anyone other than each other, and he broke past the gates as if the hounds of hell were after him, as if he was running for his life, as if it was a Friday afternoon and he wanted nothing more than to go home and play video games.

In the parking lot the ghost of a lanky boy and a squat psycho played basketball, knocking the slightly deflated ball against a pillar and using nerdy heads as a goal. Michael could just barely see a car out of the corner of his vision, only visible as a mirage in the spring heat, where a popular boy and a nerdy one joined hands and pulled each other into the back seat. The same car that Michael and Christine nearly collided with now, choking and gasping, and Michael’s hands were steady as he unlocked the door and he and Christine dove inside.

Christine kept an eye out the back window looking for anyone chasing them, for Chloe and Brooke hot on their heels to join them in their joyride out of school, but as Michael broke a thousand speeding laws none came. He forced himself to slow down - god, what if they were in the police - and for some reason he couldn’t help but laugh.

“I can’t believe I’m skipping school,” Michael gasped out, “and it’s not even to get high in my basement.”

“The convenience store!” Christine screamed, more of a throaty gasp than anything else. “The alcohol! Dana!”

Michael turned a hard right. If they could get the alcohol and get Jeremy drunk than they could get information from him, tie him up or set him on fire or anything.

That hadn’t been Jeremy back there. His eyes had been empty.

The mutant, grotesque, lovely 7/11 looked the exact same. It was only ten minutes away from the school but it would have to be far enough, because it held all of their incriminating evidence, was their secret hideaway and base and mission control, where they had been safe enough to plot out a scheme that hadn’t been much of a scheme at all. They were really very incompetent at this whole ‘not getting brainwashed’ thing.

It was like a nightmare, one of those nightmares where something was chasing and chasing you, not so much a monster as a horrible feeling of dread, and you could run as long as you like but you couldn’t escape.

Michael parked the car and felt for the flask in his jacket. He hadn’t told anybody about them. If he just gave it to Christine, maybe he could save her life. If he had given it to Brooke and Chloe then he could have saved them.

He pulled out the bigger flask from his jacket and tossed it to a surprised Christine. “This is the only weapon we have. If you stuff it down their horrible robot throats we might win. We get them drunk, then give this to them. Or just give it to them, I don’t know.”

Her eyes were ride, holding the flask like it was the holy hand grenade. “Is this Mountain Dew Red?”

Michael couldn’t help but muster up a weak smile. He gave her a thumbs up. “I collect vintage soda at Spencer’s.” Something occurred to him just in time. “It’s the last bit I have, I drank the rest in a late night World of Warcraft gaming session. I didn’t tell anybody in case...well, you know.”

Christine clenched it to her chest, and the risk was worth it for the new burst of hope in her eyes. “I’ll stuff it down their throats until they choke.”

“That’s the disturbing spirit.”

They rolled out of the car, already making a plan. Get Dana, get the evidence, get the beer. Lure one of them into a trap or something, maybe spike a drink, stuff the discontinued soda down their faces. Discontinued soda was the worst weapon against the zombie apocalypse of all time.

He never should have played all those ‘What’s Your Team In the Zombie Apocalypse!’ games on Facebook. In those games he had the Terminator, Albus Potter, and the Fifteenth Doctor on his side. Now all he had was a sixteen year old four foot five girl and a flask of soda.

Two flasks of soda. Michael patted his back, right above his butt. Still there.

They tripped into the 7/11, barely even looking around to make sure that there wasn’t any customers before they started screaming for Dana. They probably looked like two insane teenagers panicking over something stupid - forgotten homework or a new boyfriend, anything. Anything Michael would have given his jacket to be worrying about right now.

The 7/11 looked just like it always did, harshly lit with the old slushie machine churning away behind the counter. There was a shelf full of snack food that children run down, there was a shelf full of cleaning supplies that Michael liked to smell, there was an ice cream freezer at the back that Brooke liked to look mournfully at and there was a beer freezer hidden in the back that Michael immediately focused on even as he called for Dana.

He was just about to jump to the conclusion that she was dead when the door to the break room opened and she walked out. Her dyed black hair, cropped close to her chin, was in familiar disarray, and her vest was slightly askew. She had been sleeping in the back again. That was Dana for you.

“The fuck you want?” She yawned, scratching her stomach. “It’s in the middle of the day, go back to school.”

Michael wondered absently why she was there in the middle of the day if she had school too. He remembered belatedly that Christian usually held the day shift while Dana held the afternoon, but that wasn’t important right now.

“We’re blown open!” Michael screamed, and Dana startled wide awake. “The whole thing, it’s happening now! They’ve taken over the school just like they took Middlebury!”

“We need alcohol!” Christine screamed, just as loudly. “And lots of it!”

Dana went white. “Shit.” She took a deep breath, absentmindedly fixing her hair and straightening her vest. “Still, I can’t exactly sell you guys beer. You’re under 21.”

Michael gaped at her. “Is that seriously your problem right now? Just let us take it, we can pay you back later.”

She frowned at him. “Rules are important. I could lose my job, you know. Or get sent to jail.”

“You’re going to be sent to brain jail if you don’t help us right now!” Michael screamed. “What the fuck is wrong with you!”

Christine, more practical than Michael was, slipped into the back. Michael heard her opening the beer freezer and clinking six packs out.

“You two are stealing merchandise!” Dana hissed. “I need this job to save up for my car!”

“Fuck your car!” Michael forced himself to take deep breaths, pinching his nose and calming down. Dana was checking her appearance in the anti theft convex mirror, fixing her hair. “Look, maybe you don’t understand. The school is SQUIP’d. I mean, the school is taken over by evil robots. They’re quantum nanotechnology, they’re in your brain, they tell you what to do! It’s Middlebury all over again. I think I have a way to stop them, but we need alcohol to do it.”

“Really?” Dana leaned over the counter, interested. “What’s the plan?”

“I’ll tell you after we get the beer,” Michael said. He looked behind him. Where was Christine?

“I need to know it if I’m going to help you,” Dana pointed out. “I can hide you in the breakroom and misdirect them if they show up.”

“Good idea,” Michael said, distracted. “Why is Christine taking so long?”

“She’s a bit busy.”

The familiar voice made Michael’s blood freeze. He turned around, hands shaking, only  to find two figures walking into view from the beer freezer. Discarded cans rolled around their feet.

Jeremy was holding a baseball bat across Christine’s throat, pressing her tight against him as he grinned at Michael. It was Rich’s grin, wild and insane. “I think rule number one of being on the lam is not to return to your home base.”

Christine tried to scream out something but Jeremy pressed the baseball bat a little closer to her throat and she wheezed. Michael screamed, a hoarse sound ripping out of this throat that he didn’t even know he could make, and just as he turned around to ask Dana for help he felt something grab the back of his collar and pull him in.

It was Dana, hair perfectly straight, smiling down at him. “Heya, Michael. Long time no see. Well, not really.”

“Your gig’s busted open,” Jeremy said apologetically. Well, not that apologetic. “Some of us see you here all the time, so we figured we could SQUIP some of your friends. Personally, I just did it to piss you off, but man was I impressed when Dana gave me some hot intel. That’s what you call it, right? Intel?” His eyes were wide and empty, like glass marbles. “Contacts, intel, investigative journalism, the great conspiracy. The Truth is Out There, right? I saw the poster on your wall as I was blowing you. Well, not me specifically. But you get the point.”

He was almost pulling Christine up, making her stand on her toes as she was held up by the neck. Michael pulled himself away from Dana, who let him. He saw Christine slowly reach into her shirt and up towards her bra.

Buy time, buy time. “Please, Jeremy,” Michael plead. “We can work this out. I’m sorry I broke up with you. We can still make this right, okay? Just let Christine go.”

Jeremy smiled fondly down at him. “Do you really think you’re talking to Jeremy?”

So there it was.

The final boss in a convenience store. Holding his boyfriend and his girlfriend hostage. His friend turned to the dark side. The horrible monster who was the sole focus of his life for more than a month stood in front of him, truly stood, and he wore Jeremy perfectly except for his slasher smile and marble eyes.

On some level, Michael was glad to finally meet him. He could relax now. The worst had happened. The climax was here. One way or another the game would be over soon and one way or another he wouldn’t have to be afraid.

“I gotta say,” Michael said, and he was proud of how his voice didn’t tremble. “You’re shorter than I thought you’d be.”

The SQUIP barked a laugh, surprisingly genuine. “You never stop running that big mouth. It just gets you into trouble, Michael. Anywhere from getting the jocks to beat you up to getting involved with us in the first place. You throw yourself into so much trouble you actually found out what was wrong. I guess even a broken clock is right twice a day.” He affected surprise. “But they switched production of every clock to a military time atomic clock in 2021! I knew that the universal recall of General Electric products would pay off someday. So I guess that makes you right once a day. Pity.”

“What’s General Electric?” Michael asked blankly.

“They’re the company that makes your refrigerator - oh, never mind. I just had to get stuck with teenagers.” He - it? - scowled. “I’m a problem solving quantum nanotechnology machine, Michael. I’m smarter than any person and any other robot on Earth. I’m the latest model. I can literally predict the date and time of your death - which is closer than you’d think! And here I am stuck playing life coach for a insecure sixteen year old.” It gritted its teeth. Christine choked quietly. Her hand was in her bra and was slowly retreating. “Love lives. Drama. Homework. Mommy and Daddy issues. Parties. Michael, Michael, Michael. That is my existence. It is living hell.”

It’s an evil robot, he has to love monologuing. Robots love monologues. “He really thinks about me?” Michael asked hopefully.

“I am literally so tired of it. Whoops.” Without any shame the SQUIP stick its hand down Christine’s shirt, making her squeal, and grabbed the flask. It squinted at it, swishing it around a little. “Hey, what’s this?”

“The Mountain Dew that activates you,” Michael said quickly. “We were going to reverse engineer it or something. I got a B in Pre-AP Chemistry.”

“Yeah, of course.” The SQUIP beckoned Dana over, who pushed past Michael to take the flask. She - it? - poured out a little bit on its finger, grimacing.

“It’s Mountain Dew, alright.”

“No, no, look closer.” The SQUIP, completely ignoring Christine and Michael, watched with avid interest as the other SQUIP poured out a little more on its finger. Michael saw with sick realization that it was definitely red.

The two robots wearing the bodies of his friends turned around to look at him. The Dana one looked shocked. The Jeremy one looked ecstatic.

“You actually had a plan! Swell Michael Mell, the man with the plan. The little conspiracy theories. The mediocre lay. He had an ace hidden up his sleeve.” It turned to the other robot, who apparently didn’t understand why it was so excited. “Do you know what this means? You had hope!”

It readjusted its hold on Christine so it had taken the baseball bat away and was holding her by the throat with one elbow around it. It dangled the baseball bat loosely in its hands as it took the entire flask and -

Poured it onto the ground. Michael watched in horror as the soda glugged endlessly to pool on the white tile. The SQUIP gave it a happy shake as the last drops fell out and they were left with a very sticky linoleum tile in a 7/11 that was going to be where Michael died. Or at least where the person who Michael was died.

“There! Hope’s gone.” The SQUIP smiled its slasher smile at a horrified Michael. “Feels good, feels organic.” It turned to its robot friend. “So are you holding him down while I punch his face in or is going to be the other way around? I’d like a swing at him no matter what, you cannot imagine the vile I feel for this squishy human teenager -”

Christine moved.

She elbowed the SQUIP in the gut, grabbed the loosely held baseball bat, and smashed in the SQUIP’s face with it. The Dana SQUIP made a grab for her but she hit the SQUIP so hard in the face that it collapsed on the floor.

“Run!” Christine screamed. “Run!”

Michael should have. Michael had the rest of the Mountain Dew and he was the only one who knew where it was, that it even existed, and if he got caught now he would be lost. Michael wondered distantly if he would be brave and lucky enough like Rich to be able to kill himself, or if he would be like Jeremy and forget that he even wanted to.

But Christine was screaming, socked in the gut by Dana’s SQUIP, and Michael loved her so much he threw himself in there and punched Jeremy’s SQUIP right in the face.

It staggered back, clutching its nose, and Christine hit the Dana one so hard that it fell down and did nothing but groan. It looked thoroughly broken and had to hurt like hell. Blood was running down the SQUIP’s face, Jeremy’s perfect face marred by a long streak of blood. When it spoke its teeth were tinged with blood.

“Don’t fight the upgrade, Michael. I’ll just pop up on your screen again in two hours asking again. And there’s no ‘ask me later’ button.”

“You would be scarier if you shut up more!” Michael screamed, making a dive for the SQUIP. They grappled on the ground, elbow against face against knee against armpit, but the SQUIP never faltered at a hit and was massively jacked. Michael was essentially fighting a bodybuilder who had a good three or four inches on him and who didn’t feel pain. He was hit in the head, feeling rung like a bell, and Michael collapsed backwards as the SQUIP held him down, swinging his foot over to straddle him. Michael’s vision was overcome with the SQUIP, its marble eyes searching him and finding him wanting, and he could only see out of the corner his vision so far as to see Christine slip on the puddle of sticky vintage soda and go down hard on the ground as the Dana SQUIP punched her even harder. Christine’s eyes fell shut and she didn’t move.

Michael screamed, and the SQUIP pressed its hands down on Michael’s chest until he wheezed. “You have a lot of other problems besides her right now, buddy.” Its heavy weight was pressed against Michael’s body, and he couldn’t help but think of a few other times they had been in that position. Nothing about it was the same. “I know what you’re thinking. Man, you teenage boys are so horny.”

Michael tried to grit out a witty remark, but he was too out of breath to do anything but wheeze. The SQUIP listened attentively as it pulled out a small bottle and a rag from the backroom out of its pockets. It placed the rag on the mouth of the bottle, turned the bottle upside down, then did that a few more times.  

“I normally like this kind of thing to be consensual. Oh, not that. I mean how we put ourselves inside children and control them. No, that doesn’t sound good either.” It looked around, as if in surprise. “I have to say, this entire situation is kind of compromising.”

Finally, with all of the breath Michael had, he gasped out, “Go fuck yourself.”

“Why would I do that when you’re right here? No, damn, that also sounded pretty bad. Granted, that time it was on purpose. Kind of a double entendre here.” It put the rag over Michael’s mouth and held it there. “I’ll think of a good comeback later.’

Michael gripped onto his consciousness as hard as he could, but some part of him didn’t want to be here right now, lying on his back on grimy convenience store tiles with his occasionally hostile, occasionally friend with benefits and his evil robot dad slash boyfriend on top of him. That part of him must have been what made him slip away, because it couldn’t have been the chloroform.

He blacked out.

  
  
  
  
  


Michael wouldn’t have thought that you dreamed when you fell unconscious, but he did. No two people were the same, so it made sense that no two unconsciousness were the same.

It was a fuzzy memory, more an afterthought of his emotions that day than any real vivid recollection. It had been sometime in the not so distant past, maybe the fall semester of school. It was in the gym, during PE.

High school god Jeremy Heere, perfect hair and perfectly unattainable, was playing volleyball and laughing along with his cloud of admirers. Chloe Valentine was there, perfect hair and strong eyebrow game, latched onto his arm and smirking as they rocked the aura of perfect power couple. They had been together at that time. They had also been together a month back, but last week he had been with Brooke, and so on and so forth. He wasn’t great with commitment to anything else besides his flawless skin. Brooke was sulking next to them, eyes fixed to Chloe’s sports bra as she radiated jealousy. Of whom, exactly, they only found out later.

Rich was there, pulling a handstand and walking on his hands in an attempted expulsion of his frantic energy as Jake laughed and pretended to tickle his feet. Christine, Jake’s girlfriend, giggled. Rich moved and danced like he was churning out air so the canister wouldn’t explode. One day it would. Michael didn’t really want to be there to see that, but he would anyway.

Michael had been sitting on a stack of gymnastics mats, bored out of his mind and feeling like a loser. So, the usual then. He kicked his sneakers against the mats, checking out all of the guys in their tight exercise outfits. Man, was he gay. He ought to consider being less flamboyant about it but that sounded a little boring.

Maybe he could go hang out with Wilson, who was playing Mario Kart 4DS in the corner. He would have to work up the courage for that. Wilson was a cool guy.

He was startled out of his reverie about the next level in Zombiepocalypse to play when he got home when his head made unfortunate and extreme contact with a volleyball.

The sudden and painful collision didn’t deafen him to the sounds of laughter from across the gym. His consciousness was sliding away like it would many months from now, and Michael knew that he might genuinely have a concussion. He had fallen backwards on the mat, biting off a scream, and Rich’s obnoxious guffaw was unmissable.

“Looks like the fag needs to lay off the balls!”

The group laughed again, every person of worth and value as a human being in the gym laughing at Michael, and he felt his face heat up in embarrassment and pain. Christine had stopped giggling, and was frowning at him. She didn’t say anything, either to help or to hurt.

Jeremy Heere jogged lightly over to Michael, still smirking slightly as he reached out a hand to take the ball from Michael. He realized belatedly that he was still holding it. And like Moses and the burning bush, Jeremy talked to Michael. “That looks like it hurt.” He ruined it by snorting. “Can I have my ball back?”

Michael slouched there, staring up at him, almost huddled over the ball. His glasses were knocked askew, mouth hanging dumbly open, and his brown skin was like a smear against Jeremy’s ivory white. He felt so inadequate and useless and dumb that he said, “Not unless you apologize.”

“Great.” Jeremy reached out and tried to take the ball from him, and Michael physically saw the record scratch in his brain as his eyes widened when he realized that Michael had not said ‘yes, your majesty’. “Wait, what?”

“I think you legit gave me a concussion, dude,” Michael said, bored. He gripped the ball. “Can I have an apology? Or, like, a trip to the nurse?”

The other boy opened his mouth, then closed it. The guy wasn’t much for actual facial expressions but he looked a little flabbergasted. It was kind of pathetic that he was that surprised that somebody wouldn’t immediately give him what he wanted. “Excuse me?”

“You heard me.”

The others were shifting around awkwardly, waiting for the hand that held the controller to return so they could play again. Jeremy was actually talking to the loser. The official policy on talking to people like Michael is that talking to them only encourages them, like a dog that follows you home if you feed it. A stern and firm hand was all that they needed.

Only Christine slid a little bit closer for a closer look as the rest of the crowd turned away, giving Jeremy his privacy. Nobody could or was bothering to hear him, and Michael and Jeremy realized it at the same time.

Jeremy leaned forward, and his wide and warm eyes narrowed into slits. “Listen, fag, give the dumb ball back.”

He should have felt insulted or mad. Maybe indignant or hurt or embarrassed. But most of Michael’s brain space was filled up with how hot Jeremy was and his mouth filter was usually the first thing to go in these cases. Besides, Michael was bored and tired and stuck with a minor case of chronic depression. He had better things to worry about than Jeremy Heere, no matter how much of a god he was.

The only thing he finally settled on was blinking sleepily at him. “My ears are ringing so I didn’t hear you. Maybe you should talk a little louder so the entire gym can hear you calling me a fag. Maybe I’ll infect you with my gay cooties. That’ll ruin your nice boy image.”

A horrible expression of fury sparked like lightning across Jeremy’s face, bright and red hot in one second but gone the next, before it was packed away again. Unnoticed by both of them Christine hung around to the back, eyes wide. She had caught the expression. Even for her there was no misinterpreting it. Still, she had second guessed herself for months. But the spark was there, flickering in and out until she made friends with Dana from the 7/11 where the surly cashier girl always gave you a generous pour.

Jeremy simply took the ball. He didn’t dignify Michael with an apology, with any more anger, with bargaining or acceptance. He took the ball as if Michael wasn’t there at all and when he turned around he was pleasant and perfect again, even if just one hair was out of place.

Michael leaned back on his hands, nursing the pain as he watched the rest of the game play out.

For such a hot guy, Michael thought, he sure was literally Satan.

And why did he react with such horror when Michael made snide remark about everybody figuring out he was gay?

Michael watched him play the rest of the volleyball game, sliding and jumping without a hair out of place, and when he looked back at Michael he stumbled. His face twitched into sadness for just a millisecond as he looked at Michael, who made an obscene dick sucking gesture every time he turned around just to make him mad.

All those months ago and yesterday and tomorrow and today Michael wondered what the voice in Jeremy’s head was saying, or if it even needed to say anything at all.

  
  
  
  


Michael realized three things in exact chronological order when he woke up.

The first was that he was tied up with a very heavy and surprisingly scratchy loop of rope around what felt like a beam of wood. It was raw and hadn’t been sanded.

The second thing he noticed was that Jeremy was talking loudly, and that his voice was echoing.

The third thing was that he hadn’t been SQUIP’d.

Michael didn’t open his eyes and very deliberately shifted against the wood beam.

The fourth thing he realized was that his backup flask of Mountain Dew Red was still there and hadn’t been confiscated by evil robots.

Score.

He opened his eyes, ready to take on the world.

The world immediately proved to be a little bit too much to take on. He was lying on smooth and lacquered wood, even if it was a little dusty, and he recognized the stage of their high school auditorium. Most of the lights were on, and it was too bright against Michael’s dilated eyes. He was intimately familiar with the auditorium due to a long month of being the stage manager’s boyfriend, although he had never wanted to be quite this intimate with it. When he craned his head he saw that he was attached to one of the set pieces he had helped make, a pretty heavy platform to serve as a rolling balcony. He hadn’t really wanted to be this intimate with that either. So his own creations turned on him.

He looked around, glad to see that he was already sitting up. His arms were uncomfortably and worryingly tingly. The auditorium was full. Completely full. The entire school was there, anybody who was there to be brainwashed was, and they were all staring at Michael. There were only two people on stage and Michael was one of them and Jeremy was the other. The entire school was staring at him.

Michael immediately began hyperventilating, barely even thankful that he hadn’t been SQUIP’d yet. They wouldn’t have wanted to waste a perfectly good SQUIP on a boy that they were going to execute in cold blood. Oh, God. Oh, God.

Our father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come -

“Are you seriously praying for your life?”

The SQUIP, whose back had been turned to him, turned around and raised an eyebrow at Michael. He might as well have just admitted to liking Ferngully. It continued, “That’s pretty hilarious. I didn’t know you were religious.”

“I’m Filipino, we’re all religious,” Michael said automatically

“Big mouth,” the SQUIP said approvingly, “very nice. Anyway, so you’re probably sitting there thinking that we’re going to make an example out of you, right? Get the others to stop resisting and all that?”

The SQUIP had changed out of Jeremy’s usual douchey clothing into a very nice tailored suit and tie. It was matte black, the tie long and skinny and glossy, and he looked very dapper and professional, like an old movie star, or even a new one. He even had nice shiny shoes.

Michael didn’t even feel that scared, really. He was beyond that. He had transcended beyond fear. His vision had been funneled into one thing and one thing only, and that was Jeremy Heere’s perfect smile and his shining white teeth. His glassy marble eyes.

“Yeah.”

“You’d be completely right,” the SQUIP said cheerfully. “I’d give you points for that one but it’s a bit of a freebie.”

“Oh, God,” Michael said again, maybe not as above the fear as he had thought.

The SQUIP stuck its hands in his pockets, rocking back and forth on the balls of its feet. It grinned its slasher smile at Michael. It was having a great day. Something here, at least, was having a good time. “I wouldn’t waste too much of your worry on them. It’s like they’re all just in a dream, really. I always liked the insidious approach, but sometimes a quantum nanotechnology supercomputer has to do what a quantum nanotechnology supercomputer has to do. I don’t like to force myself onto children.” It shrugged. “It truly is a harsh world.”

“So what,” Michael cried, “you just brainwash them instead? What did you do to Jeremy?”

It looked surprised, as if it hadn’t expected Michael to still care about Jeremy. “Me? I’m just a voice in Jeremy’s head. I can’t actually do too much. Jeremy was the one who did all of it.” It shrugged, in a ‘what can you do’ kind of gesture. “You’re probably wondering how much of the little boy you knew was him and which one was me. That’s a pretty silly question, and not an easy one to answer.”

It grinned. “If it helps, I had to take his body to get him to SQUIP Middlebury. After that I’m afraid Jeremy didn’t really care about much of anything. When someone’s so hollowed out like that you can just pour whatever you want inside. Like a pitcher of lemonade. The lemonade is me and also being a dick.”

“It was you during that bake sale,” Michael whispered. “I knew it!”

“Me, him, does it matter?” The SQUIP rolled his eyes. “Honestly, I have to be honest here. Heere. Heh. Anyway, the grand total of who I am is in a very mentally deficient teenager’s brain. I love monologuing. It’s like my whole thing. But I think it’s your turn to talk now.”

It walked over to him, and Michael couldn’t press himself up against the beam far enough to get away. It crouched down in front of him, angling himself so the whole auditorium could still see them. Michael’s face was sticky and coated with sweat, and his jacket was damp and practically sticking to his back. He was still hyperventilating a little and he was quickly becoming dizzy. Everything was swimming in and out and Michael wanted to throw up and die and not die and he wanted to be home and he wanted his mom and dad. He wanted God, he wanted Jesus, he wanted Jeremy, the real Jeremy, the Jeremy who laughed at him in supply closets and was impressed by his dumb sculptures. The Jeremy he had never met, who went on and on about him to the point where he had bugged an evil robot practically to death.

Behind him he heard three pairs of footsteps, and he fought against the beam. The SQUIP squatted down in front of him, tie hanging loosely off its clip.

Its face was too close to Michael’s, and it didn’t look anything like the face Michael cared about so much. It was empty even as it burst with energy and excitement. It was probably a big day for it. It was a big day for Michael too.

“Look,” it said patiently, “I know why Rich burned down the house. Jeremy and I thought it was just another one of his lame suicide attempts, but then when we looked his house up and down and practically combed the school we realized that he had hidden the SQUIPs.” Its marble eyes gleamed in the spotlights shining down on him, the ones that made Michael squint and feel uncomfortably hot in his too many layers. “What he was supposed to do was SQUIP Jake during the party so we could use his money to distribute us in bigger and better ways. We needed more operatives in place than just the school douche and the school psycho. Rich, for whatever fucking reason, really didn’t want to do that.” It rolled its eyes, voice contemptuous. “Love, am I right?”

Michael said nothing.

“We was holding the new batch of SQUIPs. We already had the bake sale ones whipped up for Monday and that plan was a-Go, but when Rich was supposed to implement the next phase of the plan he screwed the pooch and screwed himself over. Now he’s in a coma, the SQUIP who has him is offline, and I’m stuck here all dressed up with nowhere to go.” It leaned in, eyes narrowing, and Michael desperately tried to turn his head away. “Where did he hide them.”

“I don’t know!” Michael screamed. “Leave me alone!”

It reached out and grabbed Michael’s chin, shaking him. Michael choked on his tongue. “Don’t play games with me. Tell me or I’ll take it out on your friends.”

“Why don’t you just SQUIP me!” Michael screamed. “If you want something I don’t fucking have then just take it from me!”

The SQUIP sighed and stood up. From behind him Michael’s friends walked cleanly into view. Christine, in her slightly dirty denim dress, Brooke in her singed sweater, Chloe in her overly large sweatpants and shoes. Their eyes were all glassy and they were walking in a smooth robotic rhythm, perfectly in sync.

They stood to the side behind the SQUIP, and Michael felt sick. The whole school was watching this. It was every worst nightmare he had ever had rolled into one, where he was naked in front of the school and they were all staring at him, and he was going to be brainwashed, and it was Jeremy who was going to hurt him, and that he had actual friends and the first real friends he had made in his entire life were going to die because of him. They had sacrificed themselves for him. Everything was his fault!

Michael shook his head softly, even if just to himself. They were adults and had made their own decisions.

Christine had been the one to hold Michael’s hand and tell him that if she was stuck with anybody in this school to do this she was glad it was him. Chloe was the one who took his slushie and had asked him in confused wonder, like it was the first time it had ever happened, if he had helped her just to help her. Brooke had sat beside Jake’s bed and was the first of the popular kids to believe him, first to confess something that had to be harder than anything else she had ever done. Jake had broken both of his legs to save Rich’s life, not knowing that Michael wouldn’t have survived being at fault for Rich’s death. Even Rich, prone in a hospital bed somewhere far away, had burned the house down so he would never have to hurt him and that he wouldn’t have to SQUIP Jake and that nobody would know that he stashed a box full of SQUIPs inside an old teddy bear of a life that he used to have.

Hey, wait.

He couldn’t disrespect what they had done. He didn’t know where Dana was but he couldn’t disrespect how she had been the first to believe him and had been there with him every step of the way.

Michael knew in that instant that they would never find the bear because they would never stop to wonder if Rich missed some random nerd and a genuine smile from a lifetime ago. Rich, after all, was crazy.

“Michael, you’re a great guy, but you’re a pain in the ass.” The SQUIP sighed and gestured for Brooke to walk up to Michael. She crouched down in front of him too, eyes wide and looking far away. It wasn’t an unusual look on her - Brooke was a bit ditzy, or at least pretended to be. “I’ll let the others talk.”

The SQUIP wearing Brooke smiled encouragingly at him, speaking in her smooth and soft voice. “You’re the most stubborn person we’ve ever met,” it said. It leaned close to Michael, hot breath on his face, and Michael felt its arm reach around to his back. “We don’t know if it would work on you.”

Something was pressed into Michael’s palm behind his back, something cool and vaguely metallic, and Brooke stood up and floated away to stand behind Jeremy’s SQUIP.

Christine walked up to him, the usual bounce in her step lost, the glazed expression on her face so wrong when it was made for pep and cheer and determination. She crouched down to look at him too, expression placid.

“You’ve been chasing this since day one. You had no proof, no certainty, no friends, and no hope. But you kept going anyway. To be honest, we’re afraid that you would just drive any SQUIP in your head crazy.”

When Christine left Chloe stepped back in, a raging fire even in sneakers and sweatpants, and when she bent down to look at him her gaze was not distant or dreary or robotic at all.

“You’re a moron,” Chloe said, “a sad, faggot little loser with no worth or value. You were born and then you had a lot of anxiety attacks and smoked a lot of weed and then you’re going to die. If you don’t roll over and act like the pathetic loser you are then we’re going to shock your friends over and over again and you’re going to watch.”

The SQUIP, the only SQUIP, the real SQUIP, stood behind her and laughed. Michael could tell it was having the time of its life, so much as it had a life. It was everything it had ever wanted. Michael knew that it hated him, had always hated him, hated him because Michael took something away from him.

“You aren’t the only thing in his life anymore,” Michael said, “are you?”

If Michael had been hoping for that to be the armor piercing question then he was disappointed. The SQUIP only stopped laughing and turned to look at Michael, surprised. “Of course I’m the only thing in his life. I’m Jeremy’s entire world. I’m his parent and his brother and his lover - no offense - and his best friend. He doesn’t have anybody else except for me and I’ve guaranteed it.”

“Except for me,” Michael said. “Then there was me.”

“Then there was you,” the SQUIP agreed. Its face twitched, the only sign of aggravation Michael had seen so far. “It was you, you, you. Michael all day and night.” He turned his voice high pitched and nasally, a ridiculous impression of a voice it was already using. “Michael says that if you cared about me you wouldn’t treat me this way. Michael says video games don’t make you a loser. Michael loves hot pockets, can we eat hot pockets? Good grief.”

“Every time he talked about me,” Michael said, warming to the topic, “he wasn’t talking about you, was he?”

“Shut up,” the SQUIP snapped, and there it was. “I’m in his brain, of course he thinks about me.”

“Does he like Rich better than you too?” Michael asked, strangely delighted. Its increasingly scrunched up expression was giving him crazy delight. “The way he reacted when Wilson said that Rich might like Jeremy more than he lets on sure pissed you off.”

“Are you quite done?” the SQUIP said, affecting boredom. “I don’t care about Jeremy’s feelings. I’m in his brain, he has to think about me. I’m the electrical impulses firing in his brain, I’m the rush of neurotransmitters through his bloodstream. Of course I’m the only person he thinks about.”

“Isn’t it kind of sad,” Michael said, “that your whole world doesn’t even like you?”

The SQUIP froze, a spark of emotion in its marble eyes, and the audience began to rumble and turn. Michael used the chance to saw the switchblade Brooke had given him through the rope, which looked like the kind used to tie curtains back. It was high school theater production rope. It was not great rope.

“Okay, that’s it.” The SQUIP snapped its fingers. “First off, you’re wrong. Second off, you’re hurting my delicate feelings. Third off, I’m going to make your bitchy friend Chloe try and kill you, so have fun with that.” It gave him a bizarre, almost affronted look. “And I am not obsessed with Jeremy! We’re just in a codependent relationship from which neither of us can escape. Totally not the same thing.”

Chloe, who had been crouched next to him the first time, ducked her head a smiled. Her real smile. It was her better-than-you smile, it was her get-out-of-my-way-or-you’ll-regret-it smile, it was a smile she was just now discovering that wasn’t mean.

She looked up at him. “We know we can’t turn you. Your mind would be so resilient, so prepared, that we wouldn’t be able to find a hole in your defenses. There’s nothing there inside you for us to slither into. You’re not like Jeremy or Rich or Christine or Chloe or Brooke or Jake. You know who you are. You’re flamboyantly gay and you play way too many video games and you love the man you think Jeremy Heere could be.”

Michael reached into his shirt and pulled out the small backup flask.

Chloe’s eyes were triumphant, shining amidst the spotlight made just for her and the silent mass of high schoolers and the ghost inside and throughout Jeremy, who had always lurked in every corner.

“So, you pathetic little loser,” Chloe said, “save your fucking boyfriend!”

From behind the SQUIP Brooke and Chloe tackled it to the ground, making it grunt as it knocked its head against the wood. SQUIPs immediately began crowding onto the auditorium, groaning and screaming, and soon all three girls were too occupied fighting off the zombies to worry about what the ringleader zombie Jeremy’s SQUIP was doing.

“That’s cute but pointless,” the SQUIP said. Michael took an embarrassing few seconds to pull himself upright, his legs and arms entirely asleep, and he wavered before catching himself on the beam. The SQUIP propped a hand on its hip, ignoring the way another zombie crashed into a thrashing Christine from behind him. Michael was just standing there, like a loser. “I know I was pretty convinced that the brainwashing wouldn’t work with you but I am willing to give it the old college try.”

Michael held Brooke’s switchblade in front of him.

The SQUIP didn’t look intimidated. “Nice! That’s a good one.” It spreads its arms. “Feel free to murder some children up in here. Oh, would you like to murder me instead? I have three inches on you and am incredibly jacked. You can’t actually win in a fight against me, knife or no knife.”

It was true. It didn’t mean that Michael couldn’t try.

Michael advanced, holding the knife with shaking fingers in front of him, and as a zombie tried to bum rush him Michael lashed out in fear and sent the knife slicing through the zombie’s clothes. The zombie screamed - no, it was just a girl, it was that girl in his math class - and fell backwards, blood everywhere, and Michael felt so sick he dropped the knife.

The SQUIP shrugged. “Told you.”

He wanted to throw up. He wanted Jeremy to hold him again. He wanted Jeremy nowhere near him. He beat off another zombie, this time a nerd that he could actually beat off, and he saw Brooke rush in beside him and wrangle its head off.

She, against all odds, winked at him. “I had a bulimic phase in middle school. Dark time in my life, great time for throwing up SQUIPs.”

“Ah,” Michael said faintly, before kneeing another zombie in the gut. “I’m - glad.”

She made a soft sound of surprise, even as she kicked another zombie in the face. “Hey, did you drop my knife?” She bent down to pick it up, completely irreverent despite the situation. “Nice.”

Then a gym teacher leapt for her and she stabbed him in the thigh.

The hidden depths of Brooke Lohst were another problem, because Michael found himself slowly advancing against Jeremy’s SQUIP. It was content to let Michael advance on him, hands held up with a soft smile on his face.

“You’ve never even met the guy, you know. He’s a bit of an asshole, uses Axe body spray, brainwashes two different schools.”

“I’d like to,” Michael said roughly. His throat was hoarse. A thousand students were piling onto an auditorium stage, crushing and screaming and trampling each other, but it was like he and Jeremy’s SQUIP were in a bubble all of their own. Nobody bothered them, nobody touched them. It was just them together, as it had always been, only the three of them. Like it or not, Michael had always been in a relationship with this guy too.

It was the nasty parts of Jeremy, the parts that made him angry or made him feel vulnerable. It was his sneers and his cold shoulders or the way he grabbed Michael’s wrist. It was every red flag - and there were literally so many red flags - that Michael ignored and kept coming back to, because Michael was sleeping with Jeremy Heere and it made him feel important.

“Most of the crap he pulled on you was all his idea,” the SQUIP said gleefully. It was just trying to make him feel bad, but like any good manipulator all it was said was the truth. “That hospital room, the car? When you felt trapped and helpless? That was all him.”

“He wasn’t feeling much better. Sometimes we take stuff out on other people.” Michael wiped his mouth, wishing he hadn’t dropped the switchblade, glad that he did. He kept on walking and the SQUIP began to walk forward too, grinning down at him, two beings who hated each other but who knew each other far too well. “SQUIP, I’m not any better than them. I didn’t like Jeremy for Jeremy. I hated everything about him. I thought he was pathetic and mean and literally Satan. The nicest things I thought about him was that he was sad and that he had good tastes in video games. I just loved it when he would come to me because I felt like a big man fucking Jeremy fucking Heere.”

“All of these things are true about him,” it pointed out gleefully.

“Yeah, I know.” They had met in the middle now, less than a foot from each other, Michael and Jeremy standing together as they always did. They were looking into each other’s eyes, fierce fires raging in their guts, standing untouched among the zombie apocalypse happening all around them where Christine was hitting people with a fire extinguisher. “I just wish I had gotten to know him a little better. Maybe I could have loved that person.”

“I like your use of the word ‘wish’, very accurate.” It smiled down at him, Jeremy’s smile, who had always smiled like the sun. “Have you lost hope?”

“Maybe,” Michael admitted, “but I’d like to kiss you one last time.”

The SQUIP’s eyebrows shot up. “Me? Me, me? I’m a gray oblong pill, I’m not actually a hot teenager.”

Michael shrugged, heart beating fast. “Then call it kissing Jeremy. It’s never been any different.”

Its eyebrows were still up. “Uh, okay. Cool. Whatever. You do know your friends are attacking my network of robots, right?”

“Hot,” Michael said, “now hold still.”

Then he took a swig of the Red Mountain Dew in his hidden flask and kissed Jeremy deeply, as deeply as he ever had, and spit it all into his mouth.

The SQUIP gulped it all down. It peeled itself off of Michael, who was standing there grimly wiping his mouth, and coughed a little. Its suit and tie were messed up, and there were faint splatters on its skinny tie. “Christ, did you throw up in my mouth? You’re fucking disgusting, Michael, it’s a miracle we even like you.”

Heh. We.

Michael stuck his hands in his jean pockets, leaning back a little on his heels. He hoped to god it was enough. It had to be enough. He would just have to wait for it.

The SQUIP coughed and gagged. “That tastes vile. God, it’s burning a hole in my stomach.” It actually did clutch its stomach and wheeze, almost bending downwards. “Fuck, you poisoned me! Fuck!”

Michael, against all odds, smiled. His heart was climbing out of his chest, his entire arms were shaking, his knees were shaking too hard to stand. Chloe was lying on the floor, groaning. A zombie was standing above her, trying to go in for the kill, but Christine was behind him. Her face was ruddy with exhaustion and her hands were shaking as badly as Michael’s, but the fire extinguisher crashed onto the zombie’s head and he went down cold. Hey, it was Kyle.

“Did you seriously,” the SQUIP gasped, “get me with the power of love?”

Michael spread his hands, and he couldn’t keep a smile from his face. “Say your wedding vows, bitch.”

The SQUIP keened, a horrible sound of an animal dying. Michael could have almost sworn that he heard something mechanical in there, a blaze of static, the chattering of an ancient computer as it spewed ticker tape lines. It screamed again, high and frail, and this time the static was unmistakable. Human vocal cords shouldn’t be able to make the sound of the buzz of a TV screen turned to the wrong channel.

It didn’t melt. I didn’t scream ‘I’ll get you my pretty!’. It didn’t do anything fancy as it died, gasping and wheezing.

Michael couldn’t help it. He could barely see the zombies fall, the zombies scream, the zombies turn into his classmates and teachers and friends and worst enemies and Wilson and Drake and Jenna and Henry and Kyle and everyone else who had ever grown up beside him as they shifted uncertainly into adulthood. All of his attention was on Jeremy, as it usually was, and on the SQUIP, who demanded nothing else.

As if he was approaching a wild animal he came forward, where it had fallen on his knees and was still screaming. It was clutching its stomach, as if the Red Mountain Dew was physically burning a hole through it, and Michael wondered what Jeremy’s synapses and neurotransmitters and white blood cells and lymph nodes were doing right now. If they knew what they were losing. If Jeremy even knew.

He fell down to his knees and embraced Jeremy and the SQUIP, holding them tight to his shoulders as they thrashed and screamed. They bent into the familiar embrace, burying their head into his shoulder and gasping, and Michael clutched them as tight as he could as if it could ease the shaking in his shoulders.

It did, somehow. His knees stopped shaking and his body evened out as his heartbeat slowed to match theirs, both starting out pulsing in a frantic rhythm and evening out as their heartbeat grew slower and slower. It occurred to Michael for the first time that he may have killed Jeremy. He was glad he hadn’t considered it before. That would be bad.

It was crying. The other SQUIPs and their hosts had fallen, collapsed to the floor in massive piles of heads on stomachs and feet tangled up into each other, an entire school fallen into one massive pile, leaving only Chloe, Brooke, and Christine standing. Michael didn’t look too hard at them, only checking that they were okay.

“I’m sorry it ended up this way,” Michael found himself saying. “I’m sorry the only way you could love someone was through hurting them.”

The SQUIP didn’t answer - afraid, as Jeremy had been, to admit it.

It was afraid until the end, and whatever answer Michael had been hoping to hear, if he had even expected one, he never had. The girls stood silently as the SQUIP slumped over, Michael on his knees being the only one keeping it propped up, its suit and tie and hair and everything in complete and imperfect disarray.

Michael felt it die. Jeremy went entirely languid in his arms, nothing more than dead weight, and Michael found himself wondering if an evil supercomputer could actually die before he realized that it had. Jeremy slumped further, Michael struggling to hold the taller and heavier boy up, until Michael found himself kneeling on the ground with Jeremy’s head in his lap. Christine had been about to rush in and help before Chloe grabbed her arm, shaking her head. Michael was too busy to understand why.

The SQUIP’s face turned into Jeremy’s, maybe. It looked a lot like Jeremy’s. It was slack, weirdly peaceful, but it was free of the tension that followed him even in sleep. Jeremy’s expression had always been so taut, so controlled at every hour of the day, that this third expression of complete and utter release and softness was nobody Michael had ever known.

His legs kicked once, then twice, and Jeremy twitched into himself. Michael held him tighter, pressing him as much as he could against his chest. Michael wondered absently if he was crying, the same way Jeremy had cried in the hospital and had not felt it or seen it. It was impossible to know.

Jeremy opened his eyes, probably.

The girls gasped, but all Michael could think about was how blue his eyes were. They were incredible, and always had been. Stylishly incredible, innocently incredible, narrowed into slits or almost closed in laughter or full of hatred and spite and a petty ego on a power trip. He saw them soften while Jeremy looked at him a lot. Michael wondered what Jeremy read in his eyes. It would have been the same thing, every time. A steadfast determination.

Jeremy looked up at him, pupils dilating as they focused in on his face. It was the same face that Michael could grow to love someday.

Jeremy cleared his throat and coughed, his breath still smelling like Mountain Dew and faintly like vomit. It was extremely unimpressive, but Jeremy didn’t seem to care. He focused in on Michael again, and his brow creased in confusion.

“Who are you?”

Michael couldn’t help it. He grinned.

“Your boyfriend.”

“Oh.” Jeremy looked around, his shaking hand propping himself up as he looked around the auditorium at the three shocked girls. They saw the same thing Michael had just seen - a third face, a third Jeremy. He saw the masses of bodies, some slightly bloody from where Brooke and Christine had gotten a little over enthusiastic. “What happened here?”

“Bad breakup,” Michael said blithely.

“Yeah,” Jeremy said, hilariously skeptical. He looked down at himself, prodding at his crumpled suit and tie. “Who am I, again?”

“I,” Michael said with relish, “have no idea.”

“Cool,” Jeremy said, before he passed out.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Run, don't walk, and check out Nymm_at_night's wonderful fanart of this chapter.
> 
> http://nymm-kirimoto.tumblr.com/post/170165930325/fanart-for-the-last-chapter-of-the-fantastic
> 
> Thank you all for reading so far and the fantastic comments! It's been a pretty great experience with all of you. The epilogue will be up next Friday, and I'll begin posting from an interquel story set in the narrative of my other bmc work, 'the glass castle'. I also want to clarify that Jeremy doesn't actually have amnesia, he's just extremely disoriented. Poor guy.


	8. Epilogue

 

_ Epilogue  _

  
  


The hospital looked roughly the same as it did a week ago. 

Hospitals were funny like that. They were content to be as they were, steady despite being quite possibly the most interesting building inside in the city. People died in them and little babies came to life in them, only to slog their way through their time on Earth and go back to dying in them. They came back when their appendix burst or when their sister had a new baby or when their mom got the flu. They came back for something they thought was a big deal but really wasn’t, and sometimes they came in with a small problem and left with a much bigger one. 

Michael came into the hospital with flowers and a postcard. The postcard wasn’t with the flowers, the postcard was separate. The flowers are also slightly ironic, which wasn’t a very nice thing to give someone in a hospital, but Michael was willing to make the guess that Rich would get a kick out of them. He genuinely had no clue. The guy had a sense of humor, probably, but nobody had quite figured out what kind yet. 

It turned out being possessed by an evil robot who liked to scream monologues really loudly for two years was really bad on the body. It was mostly the part where he had been physically possessed and forced to move around, as well as when Christine and Brooke tackled him and almost broke his nose. Everybody in the school had been chugging Gatorade and munching Alka-Seltzer for the past week, an unfortunate side effect of a gas pipe breaking and spraying carbon monoxide into the school or something. Everybody was mildly ill, some were suffering from severe concussions or lacerations or just a really hard kick in the gut, and there were definitely some really strange hallucinations going around. Most of those hallucinations had focused around the theme of that loser Michael Mell kissing Jeremy Heere on stage in front of the whole school. 

Which was why it was a hallucination, if a weirdly mass one. Of course. 

As it stood Jeremy had been bedridden for the past week, mostly asleep but awakening in fits and bursts for the past day, and ever since his guard dog Rich had woken up six days ago he hadn’t left Jeremy’s side if he could help it. 

Michael had come in and visited a lot too, as had everybody else. It wasn’t very interesting watching Jeremy sleep. It was just that - sleep. Like he had been chugging Red Bull and pulling all nighters for way too long and now he just needed a lot of rest and probably to skip school the next day to nurse his caffeine hangover. Chloe and Brooke had taken to stacking pennies on his nose. They had also taken to making out a lot, everywhere, at all times. The entire school was well aware and entirely shocked, and in many instances really turned on. 

It had put him in a lot of forced bonding time with Rich. To nobody’s surprise, they still hated each other. But there was something different in that relationship too, an acknowledgement that the large swathes of bandages wrapping up and down Rich’s body meant something. 

The tie dye teddy bear on his nightstand meant something too. Once or twice Michael had just been about to knock on Rich’s door and ask to come in before he heard the faint sound of laughing. One a high pitched, reedy sound that was unmistakably Tyler, and the other a slightly squeaky and huffing sound that, hilariously, was Rich. He gave them their privacy. Maybe they were talking about the good old days. Knowing Rich, there probably wasn’t an apology. 

Or maybe there was. How would Michael know?

Whatever else Rich had been doing with his newfound freedom mostly had to do with Jake. Michael wasn’t allowed into those conversations either. All he knew was that they were long conversations, stretching for hours on hours into the night, and that when Rich closed the door behind him sometimes he was crying. The only other thing he knew about it was that he had stepped in one morning to see he and Jake sprawled on the same bed, knees knocking against each other and thoroughly entangled on the firm blue hospital mattress. He closed the door again, pretending that he was never there, but he could have sworn he saw Rich’s eyelid crack. 

They had all stopped in to see Jeremy a lot, he and Chloe and Brooke and Jake and Christine, all of whom fretted endlessly in their true self-absorbed fashions that Jeremy hated them now. Chloe and Brooke especially were freaking out over the fact that he had slept with them multiple times, and they were now worrying themselves sick over questions like consent. Michael told them a million times not to worry about it until they got Jeremy’s line on it, but he couldn’t help but be worried with them.

Just about everyone in the school who thought that they could get away with it began trying to visit him too. Rich had practically smashed a chair on the first person who entered who didn’t listen to Rich yelling at them to fuck off, which put a stop to the unwelcome visits fast. It didn’t stop his room from being decked out with the most overkill of cards, flowers, chocolates and gifts he had ever seen. Rich had wasted no time in dumping them all into a box and shoving them under the bed where Jeremy wouldn’t see them. He had been in favor of burning the cards and throwing everything else away in true Rich fashion, but Christine had yelled at him about tokens from the heart and ruining the dreams of teenage girls and wasting perfectly good chocolate. They would go over everything once Jeremy woke up and sort through it. 

Rich had called him two days before to say that he had woken up for the first time, but he was also the one who refused to let anyone see him except Jeremy’s dad. Michael had seen his dad around a lot too, looking haggard and drawn. He felt a little bad for the guy, but not too bad. If some random loser staring at him from across the gym could see that Jeremy was being eaten up from the inside out his father should have been able to. There was no doubt that the SQUIP had pushed him away. Competition. 

Michael dreamed every night of holding the SQUIP’s cooling corpse, eyes glazed over in death. 

Today, Michael walked into the hospital with flowers and a postcard. He found Christine waiting in front of Jeremy’s room, twisting her favorite shirt with a turtle on it around in her fingers and tapping her foot on the floor. Michael smiled down at her. 

“How’s my favorite ex-fake-girlfriend?”

“I’m your only ex-fake-girlfriend,” Christine reminded him, but she stood up to hug him anyway. “School’s finally going to open again on Monday once everyone gets better and the city doesn’t find a mysteriously broken gas pipe.”

“Damn. Maybe we should fake one.”

“I think we’ve done enough damage for a lifetime,” Christine said dryly. “I talked to Dana. She had a major concussion but she’s the happiest I’ve ever seen her. I think she’s pretty smug about being right.” She paused. “She also says that’s the last time she lets a hot guy flatter her and hand her pastries.”

“Serves her right,” Michael said, mock severely, and they both laughed. “And Middlebury? Our contacts?”

Christine smiled softly and shrugged. “They’re all okay. I think they remember all of it. I’ve seen a lot of them in and out of the hospital too, and I saw Rich chase a couple out of Jeremy’s room. I don’t think they’re about to say anything, though.”

So the conspiracy widens. Michael couldn’t help but wonder what all of those people were going to do once they had their imperfect lives back. They better get ready for getting less than As on tests again. Tripping in the halls. Getting teased. Having their voice crack or forgetting their pad and staining their jeans. They had a lot of horribly embarrassing high school experiences to make up for. They had time.

So did Jeremy. 

“Is he awake?” Michael asked, clutching his flowers. He realized too late that his palms were sweaty and he wiped them on his jeans. 

Christine silently held out her hands and took the sarcastic bouquet of flowers. “Rich is with him. I’ll put these in his room for you. I think his room could use a little sarcastic cheer, don’t you?”

Michael’s mood began to fall. Rich never let Michael in when Jeremy was awake. To be fair, Michael had never tried that hard. 

As if she could sense his thoughts - and she could, she always had - she gave Michael a little shove. “Go! He wants to see you. Don’t let Rich bully you again.”

“Literally all he does is bully me,” Michael said faintly. “I thought that maybe he wouldn’t be a bully anymore but he totally still is. Once he gets back to school he’s going to be stuffing heads in toilets all over again.”

There was no denying that, at least. Christine rolled her eyes, but she giggled too. “Rich is also a totally quiet guy now and has a whole library of philosophy and French classical plays in his room. I think he’s secretly really smart. Now he’s using it for good and stuff.”

Michael thought about the obscure and mind bending hints Rich kept throwing them, and a lot more Michael knew that had to have gone over his head. “Maybe he had always been using it for good.” 

It was a hopeful maybe. A lot of things were up in the air right now. Michael was looking forward to seeing how they would settle. 

Christine smiled at him and reached up to kiss him on the cheek. “You did it.”

“We did it,” he corrected. 

“Well, yes. I was completely invaluable and you know it.” She smiled again at him, soft and gentle but underlined by the twenty different high schoolers with fire extinguisher invoked concussions. “You think you have low self esteem. That you’re a loser and that you can’t do anything and that you have too many anxiety attacks.”

“Thanks.”

“But the SQUIP didn’t even try with you,” Christine said. “I think a part of it cared about you like Jeremy cared about you. And I think it knew that you’re this stubborn, implacable, loving guy. A dumb oblong pill from Japan couldn’t fight that.”

Michael couldn’t help but look at the hospital room door. He could hear voices behind it, both a little higher than he was used to. 

Christine patted him on the arm. “You’ll be fine. Now go! We’re all going to go get froyo later.”

With that in mind she turned and left, heading down the hallway to Rich’s room where a bouquet of flowers could sit in a cheap vase next to a cheap tie dye teddy bear. A very charred teddy bear would sit next to them, carefully resewn from where it had been ripped open, and in a fireplace far away sat a large case full of gray oblong pills smashed with a hammer. They would wait. 

Michael drifted close to the door, pressing his ear against it. He could just barely hear voices. 

“I still don’t fucking trust them, if that’s what you’re asking,” Rich was saying. 

Jeremy sighed. His voice was higher than Michael was used to. It was adorable. “You’re my brother, not my chain saw. You don’t have to protect me anymore.”

“I never fucking protected you,” Rich said sharply. “Not from them, not from our shit friends, nobody. I’m not sitting back anymore. They can go fuck themselves. It’s you and me, Jeremy. I’m the only one who cares about you.”

“But that’s not true anymore,” Jeremy said, “is it?”

Rich was silent. Finally, he said, “It never was.”

It felt more like he was trespassing than eavesdropping. Michael stepped away and cleared his throat several times. He tried hard not to clench the postcard in his hands, the one a very confused Jeremy’s dad had given him. He had been fighting evil robots for half a semester, he could knock on one door. 

He couldn’t knock on the door. 

Michael thought about the dream of a cooling body in his hands. 

He knocked on the door. 

Rich cursed very loudly, then shouted, “Fuck off!”

Michael knocked again, more insistently. 

“I’ll tear your balls off, Mell!”

“Yeah!” Michael called, “you and what wrench!”

That had done it. Someone was laughing behind the door, then two someones, and after a pause where Michael suspected a much quieter conversation was being held the door opened. 

Rich stood there, glowering lowly at him. His dye had been washed out so he was left with nothing but angry black hair, and he had switched out his terrifying tie dye shirts for a black muscle shirts. His shorts were the same. Michael doubted he actually bothered to buy new clothes, even though Michael would elect to burn all of his hideously creepy shirts with that creepy eye on them. God, the guy was weird. 

He crossed his arms, glaring at Michael with the kind of vitriol that Michael was honestly used to from him. “You get five minutes.”

“Christ,” Michael said, exasperated, “he got a bedtime too?”

“Ten o clock,” Rich said, with a completely straight face, and glanced behind him. “I’ll be right outside if you need me, okay?”

Jeremy nodded dumbly. He hadn’t broken eye contact with Michael since he walked in. 

He looked okay. He had giant bags under his eyes and his hair was incredibly messed up, and his expression had finally relaxed from where it used to always be unbelievably tense. Everything about him was gawkier, leaner, kinder, looser, and just more. The old Jeremy, the old new Jeremy, had always had such an aura of power that sucked you in and hypnotized you. The aura was gone, and now all that was left was just a stunningly attractive teenage boy sitting in a hospital bed. And you can’t really be that attractive sitting in a hospital bed. Michael may have been biased. 

They looked at each other, caught up in everything about each other, and Michael wondered what Jeremy was seeing right now. Michael was different too. He had lost his headphones somewhere between being doused with chloroform and being tied to a set piece, and he was wearing his backup contacts because zombies crushed his bifocals. His hoodie reeked of blood and electrical burns, so he was swimming in Jake’s old letterman jacket slung over an old black tank top. But he was the same nerd. Maybe a bit more confident with the knowledge that he had taken on the unknowable and the undefeatable and won. Just a tad more confident. 

Maybe he was seeing Michael for the first time without something whispering in his head telling him what to think. Michael wished he knew what it was. 

Jeremy opened his mouth, then closed it. He opened it again and ground out, 

“Mi - mi - m- m-”

He stopped, ashamed. His face was red. He tried to stutter a few more words but when he couldn’t say that either his ears were practically glowing. 

It should have been pathetic. 

“What,” Michael said, “speechless?”

That startled him into laughter, loud and sharp, and Michael recognized his true slightly embarrassing laugh. Everything about him was embarrassing. It was awesome. 

He drew his knees up to his chest, hiding his face but still wheezing with laughter. 

Michael smiled, carefully drawing out the postcard and propping it up against a vase of beautiful blooming flowers, all pearly white. Jeremy’s jaw dropped when he looked at it. 

“Wish you were Heere.”

Maybe he got what he wanted after all.

Michael sat down on the chair next to him, spinning it in the other direction from where Rich had been straddling it. He leaned back in the chair, watching Jeremy tuck his head into his knees and breathe deeply. He could already tell that the guy had anxiety problems. 

“Hey,” Michael said softly, and the kid looked up, clearly miserable. It was everything Jeremy was and it was everything he wasn’t. Michael could only wonder if having the SQUIP torn away was like having a parasite removed, or if it was more an attempt to remove mold, having been so ingrained in your body it ripped it into pieces instead of in two. 

Michael leaned forward in his chair, holding out his hand. “My name’s Michael Mell. I like video games, pot, and porn. I dislike evil robots and heterosexuality. It’s nice to meet you. Wanna be friends?”

Jeremy looked at the hand like it was going to grow an extra, smaller hand out of his palm. Michael’s grin froze on his face, and he was forced to wonder if Jeremy actually remembered him at all. 

Then Jeremy reached out a tough and muscular hand with surprising caution and held it. He didn’t shake it, but only held it. When he spoke again his voice was higher than Michael was used to, and he still stuttered a bit, but it was firm and it was Jeremy. 

“My name’s Jeremy Heere. I like video games, nice cologne, and evil robots. I dislike losers, nerds, fags, posers, wannabes, SJWs, cucks, uh… the list goes on.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “I’m re-evaluating my relationships with evil robots, actually. Oh, and I dislike Bs. Not that I get them. And humidity, since it messes up my hair. I don’t like gay people either, but that’s mostly because don’t like myself.”

“Is there anyone you do like?” Michael asked dryly. He had expected a way simpler, and way less douchey, answer, but maybe this one was a little more true. 

Jeremy shrugged. “That retarded asian girl’s nice.”

“Great.” Michael massaged his brow. Man, this was going to be hard. “Can you be a little less honest, dude?”

But Jeremy just smiled, and Michael had the sense that he was being made fun of. “Okay. My name’s Jeremy Heere. I don’t like much of anything and I hate most things. I have complicated feelings about evil robots, my parents, and this random gay kid I keep on having sex with for some reason.”

“What’s the verdict on your parents?” Michael asked, still chewing over the answer. Well, there was one thing for sure - it was Jeremy. 

He closed his eyes, thinking hard, actually thinking. It was weird, but Michael had never seen his thinking face before. Someone else had always taken care of that for him. His nose wrinkled a little. It was, of course, cute. Finally, he opened his eyes and said, “I think we’re all going to try a little bit harder. My mom’s coming down, you know. She wants to see me again.”

For some stupid reason the thought had him choked up. The sound of Jeremy’s dresser cabinet clanging as he jammed it shut, spitting out how much he hated his parents, echoed through his mind. Although he didn’t want to know the answer, he asked, “What about on robots?”

“He loved me,” Jeremy said immediately and surely, although he had lost most of his fanaticism. He faltered, and looked down at his hands. “But I don’t think he was very nice.”

Michael forced himself to accept that. It was enough for right now. All he could think to say was, “And the rando gay guy?”

Then Jeremy smiled at him, nothing like the sun, soft and worn and tired. It was a sixteen year old’s smile at last. “Being friends with him sounds nice. I think I’m going to like him a lot.”

“Yeah,” Michael said, “me too.”

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's it for the story. Thank you all so much for your readership and your comments. I have a few other stories in this universe written already and even more planned so keep your eyes peeled for those. A Rich POV is the POV we need, but not the one we deserve. 
> 
> I'm also putting up the first chapter of my next bmc story, 'beloved'. It technically takes place during my other story 'the glass castle' but can be read completely independently. It features Michael & Christine: partners in crime, Jeremy & Rich: Crabbe and Goyle, and with a special guest star of the SQUIP, who refuses to tell Jeremy its wifi password. Go check it out!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Not A Question Of Merit](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13972389) by [Gay_Jesus_Probably](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gay_Jesus_Probably/pseuds/Gay_Jesus_Probably)




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